The British Open – one of the most prestigious and historic tournaments in professional squash – has returned to Birmingham’s Repertory Theatre, or ‘The Rep’ as it is affectionately known.

Taking place from Saturday 30 May to Sunday 7 June following qualification rounds at Solihull Arden from 26 to 28 May, the ‘Wimbledon of squash’ runs concurrently with the British Open Masters, which is also being held at Solihull Arden from 3 to 7 June.

The PSA is broadening its production offering to rights holders, chief operating officer Lee Beachill explains. “We’re trying to offer more content and from our perspective, just trying to get across a little bit more than just pure match coverage in our offering. We offer quarters, semis and final, and the semis and final contractually will go out on a linear basis pretty much everywhere,” says Beachill on where the live content from the British Open goes.

Speaking to SVG Europe from the 2025/26 PSA World Championships which took place in Giza, Cairo in May, Beachill adds: “For these last few tournaments we’re doing a 30 minute pre-show, which is match buildup, getting people in to talk about what’s happened in the event, what’s happening in the world of squash, what’s happening from a player perspective, and trying to get a bit more kind of lifestyle profile kind of pieces and we’re offering that to broadcasters as well. So there’s a 30 minute pre-show every day at the British Open, which goes out through squash.TV, our social media, YouTube, and all that kind of stuff, but it’s also been offered to broadcasters as well.”

Wimbledon of squash

Second only to the PSA World Championships in renown, the British Open is a hotly contested event starring the world’s best squash players. On what makes this event the Wimbledon of squash, Beachill says: “It’s the history, for us. The British Open in the sport of squash is probably the most longstanding and prestigious tournament on the calendar. For young players coming through or established professionals, when you look back through the history of the game, the British Open is always the title that came before the World Championships.

“In our sport, it’s the longest standing title with all the big names on it; all the records tend to relate to the British Open. It obviously has a title that translates across most sports; if you win a British Open in any sport, it has that prestige immediately, and squash is absolutely no different, in fact, it’s probably more so. So the last few years that we’ve been in The Rep Theatre in Birmingham, the event’s grown to be a real destination for squash fans, certainly in the UK and Europe.”

The Wimbledon of squash has been in residence at The Rep for four years now; previously it was held in Hull at the Allam Sport Centre and the University of Hull, supported by the former owner of Hull City FC, Assem Allam.

Beachill says: “Sadly, Mr Allam is no longer with us, but he was a huge supporter of squash. When Mr Allam became ill and no longer able to support us to the extent that he did, we took the decision to move to The Rep. Someone mentioned the theatre in Birmingham, and I just called in on a bit of a whim really. But as soon as I looked at it, I was like, “oh wow, this is perfect for us”.”

The production set up at The Rep is perfect for the PSA’s broadcast. Next to the main theatre is a small press position and a smaller 70-seat theatre. the production team is able to take over the small theatre space to use as the gallery.

Notes Beachill: “It’s just perfect in terms of the amount of space that we’ve got and it’s so close to the main theatre, everything is just cable runs, and is just about as good as it can possibly be. We have a tight press space on the side of the stage to try and keep out the main camera shot or what have you, but it works really well.”

Other plus points at The Rep are a steep seating incline, with the audience slightly wrapping around the stage. Adds Beachill: “The back of houses is really, really cool as well for an older style theatre, so it ticked a lot of boxes for us initially, but then the reaction to the experience from fans is the main thing that makes it so successful.”

Futuristic glass box

The futuristic glass box of the squash court juxtaposing with the older style of the theatre makes for some impressive TV, and some fast rigging. While the rigging and court building for the Open was simple due to the ready to go theatre, in contrast, the 2025/26 PSA World Championships in Cairo involved building from scratch with rigging starting on 15 April and complete on 8 May.

“The amount of things that we have to bring and build for a temporary event is minimal in a theatre for us. So long as we can just get on the stage and put the court up, we’re pretty much ready to go,” Beachill says.

The British Open is simple from a broadcast perspective, “but I think the challenges are keeping things moving forward, pushing the boundaries as much as we possibly can from a broadcast perspective,” notes Beachill.

He says on the broadcast from The Rep: “The British Open is probably one of our easiest ones, purely down to the fact that it’s kind of made for broadcast anyway.”

He explains: “Where in other locations we have to run hundreds of metres of cables to get from gallery to court and vice versa, that kind of thing, when there’s patch panels and you can just literally plug in and all of a sudden you’re ready, things like that just make it so much easier. Gantries in the roof, lighting rigs, sound rigs; it’s really made for what we do on a temporary basis, but in a permanent venue.

“So I would say it’s one of the easier ones we do from a rig perspective, but then that gives us the ability to just be able to look at new camera angles, new technology; it gives us the kind of space to be able to do that. This year for instance, we’ve added a cable camera to the coverage which we haven’t used in the UK before. We’re quite excited to see what that’s going to bring to the coverage, flying a camera across the full crowd and right up to the court.”

The cablecam is a two point camera that runs diagonally across the full venue. “It’s a cool addition,” says Beachill. “We’re also trying new angles around the court, nothing groundbreaking as such, but just having the ability to move cameras around and try and give a different perspective on how people view the sport is something the British Open allows us to do.”

Beauty shots

From a beauty shop perspective PSA is adding some motion to its on stage cameras this year. Comments Beachill: “We have more cameras on tracks that move around the court a little bit more. We have an angle where we’re looking down one of the walls of the court, as we’re trying to get across the accuracy and just how good the players are at being able to control this little ball in a glass box whilst running around at a million miles an hour is quite key to us.”

That is the heart of the broadcasting challenge for the PSA; attempting to get the skill of the athletes across in the production so that viewers at home can appreciate the athleticism and brilliance of the players.

Beachill explains: “There’s two angles that we try and cover. One is from an athlete perspective, the accuracy and how good they are, and two is the physicality of the game, and that is something that we’re very aware of trying to get across. I guess squash players in a lot of ways are the same as most athletes in that they make the sport look too easy to the average viewer, and it’s not. I think our challenge is always trying to just get across, that their heart rate has been in the red zone for the last 10 minutes. It’s that kind of thing that I think the general public can relate to. So it’s trying to pick these kind of things out that make sense.”

Biometric plans

On the use of data, biometrics is an area that the PSA is looking further into to find its next generation of information that will enhance the broadcast. It is working with its current data partner, Sports Data Labs, on what that will look like going into next season, and running some trials of biometric data wearables to see what might have potential.

Says Beachill: “We’re just going through the next generation of what that’s going to look like in terms of biometric data and the amount that we can get from the athletes. As we move into next season, that’s going to be a key area of what we try and add specifically to the broadcast. We’re speaking to several companies and we’re expanding our relationship with Sports Data Labs around what kind of wearable, where it is, and what data it is that it can give us. And obviously we’ll be working closely with the athletes to try and determine how much of that data they’re willing to give us in a real time basis, which is always a subject where we want more and they likely don’t want to give us more!

“But we are actually very lucky in that squash players – our athletes – are so good at buying into new technology and giving us the ability to try and show people how great they are. So we’re pretty excited about that. I wanted to move a little bit faster on that side of it, but this summer is going to be a key period for us because I do want to go into next season with a whole new kind of graphic stack that gives us a lot more data.”

The PSA did an initial biometric heart rate data trial with Sports Data Labs prior to the pandemic and since then it has been looking into what more it can get from biometrics, outside of heart rate data.

“In that biometric and wearable space, technology is moving so fast and we’re keen to kind of be at the front of that if we can,” says Beachill.

“I know many other sports really struggle with trying to get that kind of data from athletes and show the general public what they’re going through. We’re at the other end of that scale where we can kind of try and make that work.”

Watch the PSA British Open from Saturday 30 May to Sunday 7 June on squash.TV, Sport en France, Sky Sport NZ, ON Sport, Fox Sports Australia, Myco, Polsat, Sportdigital, Czech TV, JOJ TV, Supersport and Viacom18