World Snooker Announces Changes To Pro Tour

World Snooker today announced proposed changes to the structure of the professional Snooker tour in order to further growth in the sport. These include increasing the main tour to 128 player and changing how players are ranked by prize money earnt.

At a recent board meeting it was agreed between the members that the number of players would increase from the current 100 on the tour to 128, starting from the 2013/14 season.

It was also agreed that players that gain a place on the main tour after Q School next May, will keep their place on the tour for two years instead of one, giving them more chances if they get off to a slow start.

Hopefully with the 28 extra spaces on the main tour there will be more room for more international players. specifically from Europe. The game is really beginning to take shape in these countries such as Germany and Poland and there must be many players that would like to give it a go, and with two years instead of one they get more chances.

These decisions are part of a complete review of the structure of the snooker tour which are currently being made in conjunction with the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA).

A further part of these review will include the choice of a complete revamp of the ranking system which will see it that players are ranked based on their prize money earnt in ranking events rather than the ranking points.

Benefits of these include players winning the big events get money and ranking worthy of the prestige of these events such as the World Championship and the Shanghai Masters. Some negatives are that the PTCs would be worth only £10,000 as they stand and compared to the £250,000 you would get for the World's it seems quite insignificant.

What could be looked at is reducing the amount of PTC's we have at the moment to between 6-9 and increasing the amount of money on offer. Also putting more money in to the earlier rounds of the PTCs and ranking would help players starting out on the tour, because at the moment players outside the top 32 struggle to make a living.

World Snooker Chairman Barry Hearn said: "Our sport is changing and we need to adjust the structure of the pro tour to reflect that. We are expanding on a global scale and we need to provide more opportunities to international players, and allow all players to develop their careers with the most talented ones rising quickly to the top.

"We are currently in a consultation process and will continue to work closely on this with The WPBSA. Further updates will be announced in due course."

Quotes source - World Snooker