Judd Trump and Mark Selby have spoken out on the major issues that have led to the formation of the Professional Snooker Players Association.
The new association was formed earlier this year as an independent players’ body to represent their interests to World Snooker Tour (WST) and the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA).
Four-time world champion John Higgins was installed as the PSPA chairman and told the BBC: ‘We feel as though we’ve not been listened to as we should have been in recent years.
‘The game has not moved forward with the times compared to other top sports.’
Lawyer Ben Rees, a director of the PSPA, told Metro in August about a number of issues including player welfare, scheduling and prize money distribution that the new organisation is hoping to address with the powers that be.
Trump and Selby are on the players board of the PSPA along with Kyren Wilson, Shaun Murphy, Mark Allen, Ali Carter, Stuart Bingham, Stephen Maguire, Gary Wilson, Joe Perry, Ryan Day, Barry Hawkins and Jack Lisowski.
The two former world champions have addressed the most pressing issues they want to see the PSPA resolve and they agree that they relate to conditions and venues, which they feel go hand in hand.
‘Certain events probably aren’t fit for snooker’
Speaking to Metro, Trump said: ‘I think there’s not been enough change over the last few years. I think most of the players kind of feel like it’s on the same path, nothing really gets changed. We’re just all trying to fight for the same thing and that’s the best for the players.
‘I think sometimes it’s falling on deaf ears. I think you’re now seeing a lot more players skip events than they used to, just because certain events probably aren’t fit for snooker.
‘Hopefully there’ll be something good that comes of it. If not, I think there’s just going to be a period where there’s going to be more and more players pulling out of events that they probably don’t see fit.
‘For me, I think at the moment the playing conditions aren’t anywhere near as good as they used to be.
‘There doesn’t seem to be as much care taken when venues are being picked, it’s not really with snooker in mind. It’s more of a cost thing rather than trying to do the best for the players and the best standard and the best atmosphere, the best arenas.’
Trump chose not to play in the Scottish and Welsh Opens last season and intends not to again this campaign.
‘Conditions were as bad as I’ve ever played in’
Selby had the same message on conditions and venues, hoping to work with WST and the WPBSA to achieve a solution.
‘Obviously we want to work with World Snooker. We don’t want to be against them, we just want to feel like we’ve got more of a say by doing it all as one rather than just go individually and say why you’re not happy,’ the four-time world champion explained.
‘I just think a lot of the time people think players are moaning, but the conditions we’ve played in the last, I don’t know…I can’t really remember a tournament where we’ve gone there and you think the conditions played really good, win or lose. It’s been a long while and I was speaking to a few of the boys and they were saying the same.
‘Like Brentwood [the English Open], I got to the semi-finals, but the conditions were as bad as I’ve ever played in. Then just going to leisure centres as well. We’ve got more money in the pot now than we’ve ever had and going to venues like that, I think the game’s a lot bigger than those kind of places.
‘We can only play as good as we can play depending on the conditions you have. It’s like telling Man United to go and play on a football pitch and they’ve got mole holes everywhere and expect them to play to the top of their game. They can’t do it and we’re in the same position.’
World Snooker Tour statement on venues
‘Our biggest events like the Triple Crown Series and Tour Championship have grown massively in recent years so the top players have got used to playing in huge events at outstanding venues.
‘We have over 20 tournaments on the global circuit plus qualifying events so inevitably we need a range of venues which have suitable size and facilities, given most events start with 128 players.
‘Our ticket sales are stronger than ever and fans vote with their feet. The recent English Open and British Open both had packed arenas throughout the week and the majority of players appreciate the opportunity to play in that kind of atmosphere.’
Selby added: ‘It’s nothing to do with the [table] fitters. I think the fitters are great and they do a great job. I think it’s more the venues that we’re playing in and the atmosphere of the venue which controls how the tables play. It’s the same for everyone, I get that. But it’s not nice.
‘You practice, you go to a tournament and you’re really looking forward to it and then you get there and conditions are like that. You think, well, what’s the point of having your practice table good? Because your practice table is better than what you go into playing a tournament. You think you’d rather have it the other way around.’
Selby did accept that the Waterfront Hall in Belfast for this week’s Northern Ireland Open is no issue, saying: ‘It played all right, I’ve no complaints. But this is a good venue. Aircon’s good. Facilities are good. It’s dry in there, which is great for snooker.’
World Snooker Tour statement on conditions
‘We are glad that the players share our view that our dedicated team of table fitters are doing a great job. They work tirelessly in delivering the best possible conditions in very difficult circumstances.
‘Players’ personal practice conditions, in smaller rooms with very little change in climatic conditions and tables that have had a long time to settle in, will always be very difficult to replicate in the huge arenas that the sport is played in. Those vast spaces can cause atmospheric conditions that are challenging to manage, but we aren’t afraid of those challenges.
‘We have been pushing players for feedback during events for the past two years and the more feedback we get the better. We have seen feedback lead to changes in conditions in events in China and we’ve made changes to the event in Germany that come straight from player feedback.’
‘We just feel as if some of the venues are not what they should be’
Higgins has made clear that he hopes the PSPA is a vehicle for collaboration with WST and the WPBSA, agreeing with Trump and Selby that venues and conditions are the biggest talking points at this stage.
‘A lot of people think it’s a breakaway and all these different things, but it couldn’t be further from the truth,’ Higgins told Metro.
‘We just feel as if some of the venues are not what they should be. That’s the thinking. It’s discussions about that.’
He added: ‘It’s ongoing just now, it’s just starting off really. It’s in its infancy just now. A few more meetings with some of the boys and we’ll take it from there.’
The PSPA plan to offer membership to the entire professional tour, with Rees saying that would be imminent in August, but that initial move is yet to have been made.
Outside of the players’ board, other professionals appear to know little about what’s in the pipeline.
World number 23 Elliot Slessor on whether he had been contacted yet, said: ‘No. I’ve not heard anything about it. I don’t try and get too involved in the politics of things. Obviously I know the players in it, my name doesn’t hold enough power in those circles anyway to bring any value.
‘I’ve heard conversations about it, but I’ve never sat down with one of the board members and gone through stuff.’
Chris Wakelin, who is ranked 16 in the world, is also yet to be approached, saying: ‘It might be that it’s been set up by players from a slightly different era. I think most of the players involved turned professional in the 90s or 2000s. So who knows? It might expand and they get more members.
‘All that matters is that whoever’s involved in the PSPA is looking out for the best interests of all the players. I think that’s exactly what they’ll do.’
He added: ‘I think what they’re trying to achieve is a good thing for the players and for the sport and for the fans as well. I think what they’re going to do, if they manage to get things off the ground with it, I think it’ll be a real landmark moment for snooker.
‘I think World Snooker do a fantastic job, but a lot of players have got their discrepancies with them. But if it wasn’t for World Snooker, I wouldn’t be in the position I’m in now. I’ve got an amazing life, an amazing career off the back of World Snooker.’
Selby was keen to point out that the association will be for the benefit of all pro players, saying about progress so far: ‘It’s just players chatting about what they feel would benefit the whole tour, not just as the top players.
‘I don’t want anyone to think that it’s just a lot of the top players moaning. We’re trying to do it to benefit everyone, and if it does benefit us, then it benefits everyone as well. We’ve got meetings coming up and then we’ll decide what we’re doing and then we’ll put it forward to World Snooker.’
WST said on communications with the PSPA: ‘We have been ready to speak to the PSPA since we first heard about it at the start of August and our door remains open, be that for the PSPA or for any individual player.’
Mark Allen frustrated with lack of progress
Mark Allen said on Monday at the Northern Ireland Open that he has been very disappointed with how slow the PSPA has been to organise official meetings with WST and the WPBSA.
‘Honestly, as one of the players involved, it’s been very frustrating, from my point of view, and absolutely not on WST or the WPBSA,’ Allen told TNT Sports.
‘The delays at the minute are coming from us and I think it’s unacceptable.
‘It’s just going far too slowly for my liking because WST and WPBSA have been very communicative wanting to set up meetings and we haven’t actually been able to get those set up and that’s disappointing from our point of view because it’s good that they’re willing to engage.’
Speaking to Metro, he added: ‘I feel like we’re being made to look silly and amateurish by the lawyers unfortunately, because they’re so slow at doing anything. It’s really frustrating.
‘As players we’ve been very communicative, we’ve got a lot of ideas we’ve got a lot of things we want to sit down with the WST and WPBSA to discuss, but the lawyers have been slowing things down.
‘It’s very frustrating how urgent we see things compared to them, but it’s out of our hands. There’s a lot more to it than people from the outside thing looking in would expect, but it shouldn’t take this long.
‘If it continues, it’s not something I want to be a part of, if it continues to be as poorly run as it is now.’