Sheffield keeps World Snooker Championship until 2045 with UK£45m Crucible refurb

The World Snooker Championship will remain at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield until at least 2045 following a new agreement between the World Snooker Tour (WST) and Sheffield City Council.

Key details:

• New agreement includes option to extend hosting deal until 2050
• Historic venue set to undergo UK£45 million (US$60 million) refurbishment,
• Up to 500 additional seats will be added alongside enhanced spectator facilities
• Crucible to receive UK£35 million in public funding with £10 million coming from private investment
• Alternative venue will host tournament in 2029 during planned redevelopment period

Context:

The Crucible has staged snooker’s flagship event since 1977, but its current agreement was due to expire in 2027, leading to speculation over whether the tournament could leave the venue.

Barry Hearn, the president of Matchroom Sport, which runs the WST, said last April that the World Snooker Championship would have to move from its longstanding home if the venue was not revamped or replaced. Some players, including Ronnie O’Sullivan and Iran’s Hossein Vafaei, have also criticised the Crucible for its facilities and for being too small.

Previous attempts to renovate or replace the venue, including a proposed 3,500-capacity ‘Billiardrome’ in 2005, have failed to get off the ground, while China and Saudi Arabia have been floated as alternative hosts that would be able to offer larger arenas than the 980-capacity Crucible.

Saudi Arabia has added snooker to its growing portfolio of sports events and held its first-ever WST event at Riyadh’s Boulevard Arena in March 2024.

Meanwhile, China has a long-running association with snooker and the sport’s popularity has been growing significantly thanks to the success of Zhao Xintong (pictured above), who last year became the first player from mainland China and the first from Asia to win the world title. 

Indeed, last year’s World Snooker Championship delivered a cumulative audience of 180 million on Chinese national broadcaster CCTV5, the highest figure since 2022. The third session of the final, which saw Zhao beat Mark Williams 18-12, was watched by 24.59 million unique viewers across the country.

However, the Crucible’s new agreement and planned refurbishment ends and period of uncertainty around the tournament, keeping the event at what Hearn described in an official announcement as the competition’s “spiritual home”. 

Comment:

“This is the news that players and fans around the world have been waiting and hoping for,” said WST chairman Steve Dawson. “It comes following years of close negotiation with Sheffield City Council and the UK government and we are delighted to have reached this far reaching agreement.

“I would like to thank our partners as we have shared a vision which continues the wonderful relationship between snooker and Sheffield. I can imagine walking back into that arena as the planned transformation is delivered and seeing something even more fabulous.”

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