Live from the Crucible: IMG at the World Snooker Championship 2024
When the World Snooker Championship trophy is lifted in a few days’ time, a significant chapter in the tournament’s illustrious history will close as IMG’s 26-year tenure producing coverage of snooker’s Triple Crown events ends. Senior producer Dominic Wright speaks about IMG’s work on this year’s World Snooker Championship and reflects on the past.
Taking place over 17 days, and with the final a best-of 35 frames contest, the World Snooker Championship is renowned for being something of an endurance event for the 32 players taking part. And the same can be said for those tasked with producing coverage of the contest.
In addition to the world feed, IMG is also responsible for the BBC’s produced coverage of the World Championship, including its presentation. At this year’s World Championship, IMG has partnered with Slam Media, and is also supported by facilities provider NEP (see box below).
“We are very proud of what we’ve achieved. There’s been many people involved over the years who have invested so much in the sport and coverage of it. Everything we’ve done has moved the coverage forward and helped grow the sport to where it is now, and I think IMG has played a major part in it.”
During the earlier rounds of the Championship, each day features three sessions of play resulting in potentially lengthy days crewed by staff operating on split shifts. IMG senior producer Dominic Wright explains: “Logistically, it’s a huge operation and snooker’s not like most other sports. Tennis is similar, but if you take football for example where the match is usually 90-minutes so you can work back two hours or whatever it may be for your call time, and you know you’ll be off air an hour or so after the final whistle.
“With snooker, you can start at 10am and play can overrun, so you might have to go straight into the afternoon session which can overrun again, and evening matches can easily be a midnight finish. But they can also be the most gripping; the 1985 final (between Steve Davis and Dennis Taylor) was a final frame decider that was settled on the black ball, with 18.5m watching a match that finished after midnight and is still the biggest audience on BBC2 and helped to make the sport what it is today.”
With this World Championship the final event of the current contract cycle, technical changes and advances are incremental rather than radical. In terms of the world feed, the biggest change this year is the introduction of a high and wide camera position.
“We’ve always tinkered with camera plans and different cameras and tried to tweak the coverage,” explains Wright. “We’re very happy with what we’ve produced over the years, so a lot of our work is tinkering rather than wholesale change.
“[The high and wide camera] gives viewers a bit of the crowd’s perspective because you get some of the crowd in the foreground and it provides a side-on look at the table, which gives a better sense of the length of a pot.
“If you’ve played pool, you might think snooker is easy until you step up to a snooker table and realise that it’s a totally different kettle of fish; the professionals make the game look so easy that it’s not until you play that you realise just how big a snooker table is, and that new angle helps.”
“We had a really good response from four or five players to the use of ear buds and interviews during matches….but introducing technology to the Triple Crown events is the hardest thing because they are the biggest three tournaments in snooker, so any innovation and changes have to be done gradually.”
For the opening rounds up to the quarter finals, the venue is split in half, with two tables separated by a divider. For the semi-finals and final it moves to a single table setup, with the whole audience focused on a single match at a time. It results in a significant change in atmosphere and provides an opportunity for a re-rig of cameras.
“We bring in more cameras for the final: we have the high-mo cameras and a jib, and we can reutilise all of the PTZs that we use on the other table, putting them into the dressing rooms and into the practice room, for example.
“People want to see more of what the players get up to behind the scenes. Obviously, it’s a tough balance for an event like this because it’s the World Championship – it’s not an invitational tournament. So, it’s all about striking a balance.”
While viewers might want to see more behind the scenes action, not all players are always so keen and those watching at home may have noticed players wandering around backstage before play begins.
“There’s a holding area with a sponsors board, and they’re meant to stay around there but of course they know there’s a camera there so that’s some of them being a bit cuter; you’ll see Ronnie (O’Sullivan) just walks all the way down the corridor towards the press room, others will go into the tournament office because they think they’re safe there, which is understandable because it’s the World Championship and it’s their moment.
“It’s not like being in the tunnel before a football match where players are surrounded by their teammates and staff – [snooker players] know full well that the camera’s pointed at them. So, we have to be respectful, but we’ll always be trying to push that side of it as well.”
One of the BBC presentation positions is in the player’s practice room, which provides another opportunity for a glimpse behind the scenes.
“We chose that location because it has that unique access; we had the guys talking on camera the other morning, and both Kyren (Wilson) and John Higgins were practicing behind and heard what was being said and so they interrupted and joined in, which is great.
NEP at the Crucible
In the OB compound next to the Crucible, IMG has three edit suites running full time, sometimes four, for all the VTs and inserts that are required for the world feed and BBC coverage. For this year’s World Championship, NEP has provided its Venus, Albiorox, Mercury, Voyager 1 and XStream units to support the coverage.
Such an interaction was aided by Kyren Wilson being part of the BBC presentation team, with Wright speaking of a “big shake up” of BBC presentation a couple of years ago.
It followed some comments from current world number two Judd Trump back in 2021, when he spoke about modernising the game, including changing how players dress and what was described as an obsession with the past including a focus on ‘people who were popular 30 years ago’, a failure to showcase younger talent and ‘commentators who have been around a long time’.
“I’m very pleased with how we reacted to Judd Trump’s comments about how the sport needs to be younger and attract new audiences,” says Wright.
“A lot of the people that are playing snooker now were playing in [IMG’s] very first tournament when we first started covering the snooker. So, you’ve got to tell the same story a different way. But when Judd made his comments, we got him into the studio, and I asked him to tell us what he felt was wrong and we addressed those issues with him.
“The fact that we now have new voices is a massive plus. We have had Judd, Kyren (Wilson), Shaun (Murphy), Mark Allen, and Neil Robertson’s coming in this week as well. We’ve also got the legends in Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry, John Parrott, Ken Doherty – guys that know the sport inside out and that are respected, revered and loved by audiences.
“I think we’ve got a happy balance now, and it’s been great to have that unique perspective of current players; I don’t think there’s many sports where current players are part of a commentary team and part of the presentation.”
For the world feed, the biggest change in recent years was the addition of the score graphic to all cameras in 2022. “It might not have been universally popular when we made that decision, but I think now, most people appreciate why it’s been done. It means we can bring in lots of additional information throughout the game,” explains Wright.
Since then, new graphics have been added below the main score information, including a tournament high break ladder, player profile, player specific comparison stats and a deciding frame win percentage bar providing the punditry team with reference to a wider range of data.
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Other changes have been slight, such as the lowering of the position of all the microphones towards the end of last year on the BBC events IMG has covered. Meanwhile, IMG has explored innovation in other areas such as the use heart rate monitors, and ear buds to allow for direct communication between the studio and players between frames.
“IMG is involved in so many sports, so there’s lots of experience of introducing new technology and we’re always looking at whether some new technology can be transferred from one sport to another. We’ve always tried to innovate, but with snooker I think it’s important to change a little bit at a time.
“We had a really good response from four or five players to the use of ear buds and interviews during matches….but introducing technology to the Triple Crown events is the hardest thing because they are the biggest three tournaments in snooker, so any innovation and changes have to be done gradually.”
In addition to approval from federations and leagues, introducing new technology that takes viewers into a competitor’s previously private space requires buy-in from players, which in turn requires trust, Wright says.
“We have a great deal of trust with the players because we’ve worked with them for such a long time; my first World Championship was back in 2001. Alison Witkover – now exec producer – has worked on every event since the start, with [IMG’s former Production managing director] Graham Fry. You know, these people have put a lot of effort into it to make sure we cover it as best as we can and there is trust now.
When the final ball of the World Championship is potted on Monday, it will mark the end of IMG’s final event in its deal covering snooker – one of IMG’s longest running production contracts.
Speaking with Sport Business, IMG executive vice president Barney Francis said: “We have been proud partners for many years and won’t be going forward which is a bit of a shame. We stand by to support them in the future should they require us to.”
Pride in what’s been achieved since 1997 – a year in which Ken Doherty prevented Stephen Hendry winning a sixth World Championship in a row, and Ronnie O’Sullivan achieved his quickfire maximum 147 break – is a sentiment echoed by Wright.
“We are very proud of what we’ve achieved. There’s been many people involved over the years who have invested so much in the sport and coverage of it. Everything we’ve done has moved the coverage forward and helped grow the sport to where it is now, and I think IMG has played a major part in it.”
The final of the World Championship takes place on Sunday 5 and Monday 6 May on the BBC and Eurosport
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