Li He
Appleton won the 2008 WPA World Ten-ball Championship (the inaugural 10-ball world championship) against Wu Jia-qing who was the former world champion in both nine-ball and eight-ball from Taiwan. With the victory, he became the second male player from Britain to win a world championship after Daryl Peach who won the world nine-ball title a year earlier. Appleton is also a world champion in nine-ball, having won the 2012 WPA World Nine-ball Championship, defeating Li He-wen in the final.