Wen had hoop dreams as boy

Premier Wen Jiabao showed promise as a basketball player when he was a boy, a sports teacher at his former school has said.

"The premier was a proficient player," Yuan Hua, who has taught basketball at Nankai Middle School in Tianjin since 1976, but never actually coached Wen, was quoted as saying on Tuesday by the Tianjin Daily.

The premier attended the school from 1954 to 1960.