The 2025 World Snooker Championship wrapped up earlier this week at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, with Zhao Xintong making history as the first Chinese winner. Although the tournament was first held way back in 1927, the Crucible has been the venue for the sport’s showpiece event since 1977 and is widely regarded as the spiritual home of the game. But things could soon change as Barry Hearn, the head honcho of Matchroom Sport (the organisation that effectively runs professional snooker), has suggested the tournament should move to a bigger, better venue from 2028 onwards.
Snooker “purists”, and indeed residents and businesses based in Sheffield who may benefit from their city hosting the annual event, are reluctant for the tournament to leave the Crucible. There’s even talk it could be taken away from the UK, perhaps shipped out to the Middle East or China. Given that the championship was held in several different venues between 1927 and 1976, the Crucible doesn’t have the same kind of history or significance as, say, Wembley Stadium does in relation to the FA Cup (which has hosted English football’s showpiece most years since 1923). Given that many of today’s snooker fans grew up watching snooker from the Crucible on TV in the 1980s and 1990s, there is an element of nostalgia involved and a certain emotional attachment. But neither of those is going to increase the prize money for the players, nor improve the facilities for both them and the fans!
Why Does Hearn Want to Ditch the Crucible?
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In a word, money. Hearn has done wonders promoting snooker (and other sports) over the years. But ultimately, he is a businessman and he wants to maximise revenues. The problem with the Crucible Theatre is that it is simply too small. With a maximum capacity of just 980, the earning potential from a sellout crowd is far below other potential venues. As a comparison, the 2022 Hong Kong Masters welcomed a whopping 9,000 spectators to the Hong Kong Coliseum. Clearly, Mr Hearn has done the sums and come to the obvious conclusion that a lot more cash could be brought in by shifting the World Championship to a bigger venue.
Another comparison to note is Alexandra Palace in North London, which has a capacity of 3,200. It plays host to the annual PDC World Darts Championship. And which organisation runs the PDC? Yep, Barry Hearn’s Matchroom Sport. And Hearn points to the fact that the winner of the PDC World Darts Championship in 2026 will earn a tidy £1 million. This is double the top prize at the snooker equivalent and the Matchroom boss suggests snooker players want (and deserve) bigger pay cheques. Hearn also believes the facilities at the Crucible aren’t up to scratch for a modern sporting venue. He said,
The Crucible’s been a big part of my life and a big part of snooker’s life, but it has to move with the times and someone, whether it’s government or Sheffield, have to come up with a way of showing us that they’re going to treat us with respect and give us the type of facilities we require. It’s as simple as that. It’s not complicated.
Possible Alternative Venues for the World Championship
But if the decision is taken to leave Sheffield, which venues are in contention to become the new “home of snooker”? Barry Hearn’s son Eddie, who runs the boxing arm of Matchroom, claims they could sell “4,000 tickets for each session” if they moved the tournament to a bigger venue, so they would be looking at something that could accommodate at least that many spectators. So Alexandra Palace, which hosts The Masters snooker tournament, is a little on the small side (as it holds just over 2,000 when arranged for snooker).
O2
There would be a lot of resistance in the UK if the tournament was taken away from these shores. Whether that would bother those at the top of the sport is open to debate. But there are plenty of options for bigger venues, such as the O2 (which could hold more than 15,000 spectators). The problem there might be that trying to book the O2 for two weeks each year could prove tricky, and though they might sell a few thousand per session for the earlier rounds, it may only be the semis and final that would sell out 15,000.
Sheffield Arena
An option closer to the current home of the tournament would be the Sheffield Arena. It already hosts certain sporting events, including ice hockey (as the home of the Sheffield Steelers) and could have a capacity of around 10,000. These could be a good middle-ground option as you could imagine a final between Ronnie O’Sullivan and Jump Trump, for instance, would easily sell that many tickets.
Outside of the UK
The fear for UK-based snooker fans, however, is that China, Saudi Arabia or Dubai might entice Matchroom to their shores with lucrative sponsorship deals or just a bucket load of cash. Saudi Arabia in particular has been dishing plenty of money around to host various big sporting events, including many boxing bouts, including some promoted by Eddie Hearn.
There have been plenty of accusations of certain countries (Saudi Arabia included) using such events as “sportswashing” ventures, and those criticisms would likely increase significantly if snooker’s top tournament got shifted to a country with a less-than-perfect human rights record. It will be interesting to see whether that might influence any decision on the possible future venue. But we think perhaps not given that there are already several tournaments held in both Saudi Arabia and China.
When it comes to sport, it’s often the case that fans are far more romantic than the people running (and making money from) it. In the case of snooker, it looks unsustainable for the World Championship to stick around at the Crucible, but we hope there will be a compromise to at least keep it in the UK, and ideally in Sheffield. Whether that is possible is questionable, and whether it might be at a new purpose-built snooker venue, a much-rejuvenated Crucible, or the existing city arena, remains to be seen.