A snooker icon has credited his relationship with Miss Blackpool for turning his life around after he splashed millions on gambling and cocaine.
Jimmy White MBE, 62, holds the distinction of reaching six World Championship finals and winning none of them.
Known as a big-time partier in the 1980s and ’90s, ‘the Whirlwind’ swapped ‘nights out’ for ‘pamper nights in’ after falling head over heels for Sky Sports walk-on girl Jade Slusarczyk in 2018.
He calls it a ‘miracle’ that Slusarczyk, aged 39 and 23 years his junior, likes him back and has dragged him away from his old destructive tendencies.
‘It’s impossible to say how much I used to drink in my wild days. It was drink after drink and line after line and I’d go missing for days,’ he told the Sun in 2021.
‘It took 15 years to get sober and I don’t miss that life at all. Jade’s helped me because she doesn’t drink.
Snooker icon Jimmy White has been tamed by former Miss Blackpool Jade Slusarczyk
Slusarczyk, 23 years his junior, has calmed him after an obsession with alcohol and cocaine
The 39-year-old works as a walk-on girl for Sky Sports and has rubbed shoulders with celebs
‘I’ve never been so happy and I’m pleased to say my life is in a good place. I haven’t got a zillion in the bank but I have my family and Jade.
‘I didn’t think for a minute she’d go out with me, because of the age difference.
It’s a miracle she fancies me. But she doesn’t care about the age difference, so why should I?
‘She’s my girlfriend and she’s fit so I’m happy. She’s a beautiful girl, inside and out.’
While White isn’t so active on social media anymore, Slusarczyk regularly shares insights into her life as a Sky Sports walk-on girl (regularly appearing at the darts and boxing), and the occasional photo with her boyfriend.
The pair met at a snooker tournament in Blackpool in 2018, seven years after she had won the town’s beauty contest.
White, nicknamed ‘The Whirlwind’ for his aggressive, rapid style of play, has put his hellraising behind him and settled into a lower-key life with her.
That would have been unthinkable at the height of a career which saw him reach 24 finals and bank £5million in prize money.
White, 62, has reached six World Snooker Championship finals but won none of them
During a long career, he blew millions of pounds on gambling, and could spend £10,000 per month on cocaine
Now he’s on the straight and narrow after the ‘miracle’ of being with Slusarczyk (pictured with Sebastian Vattel)
‘I gambled at least three million quid, so if I gambled three million quid I probably had to earn six or seven million to get that,’ he told the Anything Goes podcast in 2021.
‘That’s a lump, that’s retirement money, so I should be more sick with that.
‘But because at the time it was going so f***ing quick you don’t think do you.
‘I went bankrupt through gambling.’
He also told Louis Theroux’s documentary Gods of Snooker: ‘Cocaine was absolutely everywhere.
‘It was like the devil’s dandruff, but crack – it’s evil. I tried smoking it and got completely addicted.
‘I remember I had £35,000 in an account and I drained that on crack.’
The snooker ace previously admitted to blowing £10,000 a month on crack cocaine at the height of his fame in the 1980s.
Jimmy famously never won the World Championship, losing six times at the final hurdle.
Despite that the popular ‘People’s Champion’ won a host of other tournaments such as the Masters and the UK Championship.
He was previously married to Maureen Mockler and had five children with her.
