BBC Extends Snooker TV Rights Deal
The BBC has signed a new deal to screen the World and UK championships, Masters and Welsh Open until the end of the 2013/2014 snooker season.
The contract extends the BBC’s deal with World Snooker by three years.
‘We are absolutely thrilled to extend our partnership with the BBC for a further three years,’ said World Snooker chairman Barry Hearn.
‘The deal strengthens our foundations and allows us to keep pushing forward with the sport’s new era.’
Australian Neil Robertson is the current world champion after he beat Graeme Dott in the 2010 final and Hearn cited that tournament’s viewing figures as evidence of snooker’s public appeal.
‘Last year the World Championship reached 18.7 million people across the tournament, showing there is a big appetite for the sport,’ he added.
‘The World Championship, which has been extensively covered by the BBC every year since 1978, as well as the Masters, the UK Championship and the Welsh Open, has become part of the sporting fabric of the nation.
‘These events are among the jewels in the crown of the sporting calendar and it is fantastic that they are to remain on the BBC.’
One tournament that will not be covered by the BBC is the World Open, formerly the Grand Prix, which will be played overseas this year.
An announcement is due within the next three week about where the tournament will be played, with Asia, China or the Middle East in contention.
In 2011 there will be more events played outside the UK than in it, and Hearn said this fact, plus the way big name players were being beaten at the Masters at Wembley, showed the health of the game.
‘It is no surprise to me these big games have fallen this week at the Masters considering the increased activity in the lesser known events.
‘The bar has been raised. The standard is increasing all the time and if the players don’t produce their A game then they will beaten. That is how competitive sport should be. The picture is very rosy indeed for snooker.’
Hearn also revealed he was heading out to Las Vegas next week to discuss potential development in the United States.
