THE venue for this week's Coral Scottish Open could hardly be handier for Anthony McGill. Brought up in the East End of Glasgow, the 25-year-old is a Celtic season ticket holder who makes the short walk over to Parkhead on matchdays when he isn't competing. It is always nice when you can pop into your mum and dad's for a spot of breakfast on your way to the Emirates Arena to do battle with the other best 127 snooker players in the planet, even if he home comforts are a far cry from Hyderabad, where this promising young player captured his first major tournament win this year.

"It is a perfect location for me because that area is where I grew up in," McGill said. "My family still stay there, in between Parkhead and Tollcross, so it will be a cracking tournament from me. I can see Celtic Park from their window and if the Emirates was a little bit taller I would be able to see that as well. I can basically just fall out my bed and I will be in the arena."

McGill is the second highest Scot in the world rankings (18th) going into this week's event, behind the evergreen John Higgins (third) but he is one of the youngest players in the top 40 and has been known to produce his best on the big occasion. If he first announced himself to the world with a second-round victory at the 2015 World Championships against reigning champion Mark Selby - the only defeat the world No 1 from Leicester has suffered at that venue in the last three years - he followed it up this year by defeating another former world champion in Shaun Murphy. While he was just embarking on his pro career the last time a major snooker event was held in the city, the first major ranking final of his career came in front of Scottish fans at Ravenscraig, as he went down 4-2 to Ding Junhui in the forerunner of this event.

"That 2015 World Champs was the first tournament I did well in and in the immediate aftermath, as snooker was in people's consciousness, I got recognised a fair few times, which was unusual for me," said McGill. "Slowly but surely I am going a little bit higher in the rankings. Things are going all right for me. The last three, four, five tournaments I haven't really done anything but as long as overall things are going upwards that is what you are looking for."

As much as the success of darts has cast snooker in its shadow, McGill's earnings this season are £192,000. While he hopes to unseat or outlast his idols like Higgins, Ronnie O'Sullivan and the likes of Selby, Judd Trump and Neil Robertson at the summit of the sport, he remains realistic.

"You can set yourself up for life in snooker but you need to be top 10 in the world to do that and there are not many who can get that," McGill said. "I would love to be world champion and all the rest of it but realistically I might have to make a bit of money and invest in some property and do it that way. I know it isn't going to last forever.

"Guys like John Higgins and Ronnie O'Sullivan are unbelievable but they are only human, time is going to catch up on them. I am only 25 but the best years of a snooker player's career I think are from around 30 to 35."

First up for McGill is John Astley in the first round, with the in-form Higgins set to face McGill's practice partner Alan McManus in a tasty all-Scottish opener.

"It would be brilliant if I could win, incredible obviously with it being on my doorstep," said McGill. "Earlier in the season I won that Indian Open tournament so it isn't impossible if I can put in a lot of good practice. If I can go there with a bit of form I can definitely win it.

"The Emirates Arena will be a great venue though I've not really been there for anything yet. I know there is a gym and a velodrome but I've not been to an event there. The track cycling was on about a month or so ago. I went to get tickets but it was too late."

It should be mentioned at this point that McGill isn't your ordinary sportsman. While some sport stars are wary of putting themselves out there, a look at the Scot's Twitter feed reveals him to be a huge music fan obsessed with the likes of 80s Manchester band the Smiths and Pink Floyd who swears by a strict vegan diet.

"I just love music because I love music," McGill said. "A life without music would be very dull so I am constantly listening to CDs in the car, like the Smiths, Pink Floyd or Bruce Springsteen. I went to see a Smiths tribute band, called the Smyths, last April, and the guy who was supposed to be Morrissey was brilliant. I saw they were coming back so I had to get more tickets. And the vegan thing as well. It is not like I am living in Alaska, where the only thing you can eat is an eel who has just popped out of the ocean. In the kind of society we live in, there are supermarkets everywhere, so it is easy to get what you need."

The seeds of McGill's route to professional snooker were sown on a family holiday to Benidorm. While his mum and dad went out for the night, he was never off the pool tables, and that Christmas he had a table of his own to practice on.

While he says he doesn't get "value" out of his season ticket at Parkhead because he is on the road for so much of the year, the Parkhead side do have three home games - Hamilton, Dundee and then Partick - in the week this tournament is on. As well as Celtic are playing under Brendan Rodgers, McGill will settle for missing a chunk of the club's December Premiership programme if it means he has put himself in the frame for a popular home win on the other side of London Road.