Profile: Steve Davis - Cue the laughter

IT NOW seems almost absurd that 25 years ago, one third of the British population sat up past midnight to watch Steve Davis draw back his cue and prepare to pot the black ball that would make him the World Professional Snooker Champion for the third year running.

He missed – and Dennis Taylor stepped up to play the last shot of the greatest match in the history of the sport. Some 18.5 million viewers – by far the largest audience figure in BBC2's history – watched Davis and Taylor in their epic final at the Crucible Theatre, Davis losing to the Northern Irishman on the last ball of the last frame. The final score was 18 frames to 17, despite Davis having led 8-0 at one point.

Snooker in the 1970s and 1980s made idols of Jimmy "The Whirlwind" White, Alex "Hurricane" Higgins, Ray "Dracula" Reardon and Cliff "The Grinder" Thorburn. They no longer compete at the highest levels and Dennis Taylor and Welshman Terry Griffiths are pundits and coaches, while John Spencer died of cancer almost four years ago. The only one still playing in the current World Championships in Sheffield at the age of 52 is Steve "Interesting" Davis. This week he will take part in his 30th World Championship.

The nickname says it all. All the other larger-than-life characters of the game earned their monikers, while Davis had his bestowed upon him with no little irony because television's Spitting Image puppet of him was always boring and deadpan, and used the catchphrase "interesting".

The loss in the 1985 final would have been the breaking of many a sportsman, but it was the making of Davis. Until then he had seemed almost metronomic in his play, winning title after title and robotically amassing a 5 million fortune as the sport soared to the top of the television ratings. As a loser with a wry sense of humour, he became rather more interesting.

Born in Plumstead in London, Davis is always associated with Essex, to where his family moved when he was a teenager and where he still lives. His father Bill was a keen player and introduced Davis to the game to which he became "addicted", as he put it, by the age of 15.

His schooling at his comprehensive ended as soon as Davis was legally allowed to leave, and with the support of his father, who became a familiar cigar-chomping figure at tournaments, Davis became a full-time snooker player. Further support came from Barry Hearn, now chairman of World Snooker, who spotted Davis playing at a club in Romford and became his manager.

Under Hearn's guidance, Davis's progress was spectacular. He won his first professional title at just 21 and his first world title at 23, playing brilliant snooker and hoovering up titles and vast amounts of cash then flowing into the sport.

The problem for Davis was that, apart from his ginger hair, he was colourless. He boasted of his growing record collection and his love of Marmite sandwiches – Whirlwind White and Hurricane Higgins, meanwhile, were boozing, gambling and fighting their way into the headlines. In an age of genuine characters in a sport that had quickly become a national favourite, Davis was the automaton nicknamed "The Nugget", because he was solid as a rock and everything he touched turned to gold.

Then came the dramatic loss to Taylor. The shock on his face as he missed his final shot, and the magnanimous way he accepted defeat, instantly endeared Davis to the British public, which has always been quick to embrace a good loser.

Overnight his reputation changed, and the player was smart enough to go with the flow, exhibiting the self-deprecating humour that he retains to this day. Nor did he suffer any psychological damage on the green baize – from 1987 to 1989 he won three world titles in a row to earn the hat-trick that Taylor had denied him. He was twice honoured by the Queen for his achievements, with an OBE added to his MBE.

He still came across as a snooker geek, however, and though he acquired a mansion and a Porsche, Davis made an asset of his sheer ordinariness. In 1988 he became the first and so far only snooker player to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award. Davis himself made a joke of suggesting that you have to have a personality to win such a title.

Marriage to former air hostess Judith and the birth of his first son Greg coincided with a dreadful slump in form in the early 1990s that saw him go more than two years without a title. Scotland's Stephen Hendry took over as the dominant force in the sport. The public saw him more and more as a television celebrity on shows such as A Question Of Sport. It was the curse of celebrities, the pesky tabloids, that finally proved that Davis was far from perfect.

In 1995, 19-year-old dancer Cheree Palla combined with some of Fleet Street's finest to carry out a kiss-and-tell sting on Davis. She had been having a brief affair with Davis and was paid 32,000 for her part in a story which revealed the former world champion was rather more "interesting" than most people thought and that he still retained the stamina of his best playing days. The story was briefly the scandal of the day. "He used to make me run around the hotel room with just my knickers on," said Palla, who revealed that Davis and she made love seven times in one night.

Further eye-popping details supplied by Palla included a "secret" birthmark on Davis's behind. His wife forgave Davis and Palla is long forgotten, though the snooker player's marriage reportedly broke up five years ago. Not surprisingly, he preserves his privacy steadfastly but is known to be close to his two sons, Greg and Jack, the former already a noted snooker prospect.

Though his last major title was won in 1997, the fact that Davis is still in the top 24 of world snooker after 34 years as a professional is arguably Davis's greatest feat. Davis himself credits chess, of which he has long been an enthusiast, for helping maintain the mental focus which all top players require. He is a former president of the British Chess Federation, and has indulged his love of modern soul music by becoming a DJ on his local radio station – not activities which snooker players normally get up to.

The new generation of players is led by Ronnie "The Rocket" O'Sullivan and Scotland's John Higgins. Davis will surely not bother them in the later rounds of the competition and will revert to being a pundit for the BBC. It will not bother Davis's fans, as they know that with a record 81 professional tournaments including six world championships – only Hendry, with seven, has more in the modern era – The Nugget's reputation is sealed.

Davis's popularity is such that he is probably already that most venerated of British species, a "national institution". His first-round match at the Crucible, which starts tomorrow, will see him compete in the World Championships for a record 30th time, and become the first man to do so in five different decades – his first match was in 1979, when he was beaten by none other than Dennis Taylor.

The proof that Davis has made a virtue of taking a joke against himself will be seen on 29 April, the anniversary of the "last ball" final, when he has agreed to play an exhibition frame against Dennis Taylor at the Crucible. Humour will abound in what is sure to be an "interesting" encounter.