SHI Yuanyuan, or Victoria to give her the English name she chose, is a well-known figure on the tour, a former journalist providing copy for Chinese news outlets and web sites turned Sheffield-based entrepreneur. As well as organising waistcoat sponsorship logos with Chinese companies for players Victoria has since the summer been looking after Ding Junhui following his parting of the ways with long-time managers Garry Baldrey and Keith Warren. We at Inside Snooker don’t know what type of green tea she has put him on, but it is working. Four ranking titles, and counting.

Rock giants Simple Minds were playing Berlin on Saturday night, and the way Judd Trump despatched Rod Lawler it looked as if the Juddernaut had been keen to get down to the Huxley’s Neue Welt before the obligatory encore performance of ‘Waterfront’. The main Glittering Prize in the German capital over the weekend was, of course, was the £70,000 for winning the Masters. Thank you, we were here all week. Which is more than be said for Jim Kerr and his mob.

It is doubtful too many Premier League footballers would cope with the strict regime at Hertha Berlin, the capital city’s top-flight Bundesliga club. An offer for a couple of players to attend the 8pm deciding session of the Judd Trump vs Ding Junhui  final at the Tempodrom, following their early afternoon Sunday kick-off against Nuremberg, was politely declined with the response: “I am afraid it is forbidden for the players to go out after a match.” And this, without another game for a week. Based on past performance, a fair few English players would have been through a couple of bottles of Krystal before the break-off.

It may have been only the second full ranking event semi-final of his career for Rod Lawler, and a first for 18 years, but the 42-year-old was certainly playing it cool in the build-up to his big moment in front of a packed and wildly enthusiastic 2,500 sell-out crowd at the Tempodrom. The Liverpudlian spent most of Saturday relaxing but clearly aware of the possibility of extreme stage fright against Judd Trump came to the venue with wife Jo just to see the walk-ons of Ding Junhui and Ryan Day. They then promptly left, and 10 minutes before his own entrance, at 7.50pm, Lawler had to ask who had won the first semi-final.

The Tempodrom was first used for snooker seven years ago – but the circumstances and conditions presented a serious challenge for all those involved, including six-time world champion Steve Davis. The visiting Holiday on Ice show had a day off mid-run, and a hastily-arranged ‘Snooker on Ice’ was scheduled with a table installed on top of a thin carpet to protect the surface. However the carpet was little protection against the extreme cold, and Davis, Matthew Stevens, Neil Robertson and Germany’s Lasse Munstermann battled on with noses streaming and according to the Nugget “frozen up to the waist”.

The decision was taken by senior referee Jan Verhaas at the German Masters to recognise the growing influence and strong performances from the host country’s officials this season at their flagship home tournament in Berlin. An all-German line-up therefore took to the floor for Friday night’s quarter-finals at the Tempodrom, featuring Ingo Schmidt, Thorsten Mueller, Theo Selbertinger and Maike Kesseler. Mueller had to work hardest for his money, with the Rod Lawler match against Mark Davis finishing at around 12.15am.

The growth in popularity of snooker in Germany is to a large extent rooted in its coverage on Eurosport Germany, and the broadcaster pronounced themselves very happy with the viewing figures over the first couple of days, even before the business end of the tournament. Audiences peaked at just under 500,000 in the evenings, despite being directly up against the hugely popular German version of jungle reality show ‘I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here’. Apparently the same camp in Australia that housed snooker legend Steve Davis last year is used by the Germans in January and early February, and then the Dutch have their turn, and it is at least reassuring that not more than one jungle is being desecrated for the celebrity antics. Don’t say we never bring you the really big news on Inside Snooker.