Snooker’s World Championship will stay at the Crucible after a landmark deal was struck between World Snooker Tour and Sheffield City Council.
The agreement secures future of the sport’s flagship competition at its current venue until at least 2045, with an option to extend for another five years to 2050.
A planned £45m (€52m) redevelopment of the theatre will provide the potential to add an additional 500 seats, but does mean the event must temporarily relocate in 2029 and possibly 2030 while that work is in progress.
The news will come as a relief to traditionalists who feared the global showpiece could vacate the Crucible, which has staged every World Championship since 1977, and possibly even the UK itself once its current lease expires in 2027.
WST chief Barry Hearn described the venue as “no longer fit for purpose” two years ago, suggesting that its 980 capacity meant it could not compete with rumoured interest in hosting the tournament from the likes of China and Saudi Arabia.
“I thought we didn’t have a home at one stage – I can’t tell you how pleased I am,” said Hearn, president of Matchroom Sport.
“Snooker’s dream was to stay at the Crucible. This is the lifeblood of our sport and we cannot build something with the IP value of what the Crucible brings our sport.
“Without the Crucible, snooker just doesn’t look the same for me, an old man at the end of his career. I am so delighted that the rest of my life will be watching snooker at the Crucible.”
It is understood the tournament will stay in the UK during its brief hiatus due to the renovation work, with Manchester and London’s Alexandra Palace – current host of the Masters – mooted as potential temporary alternatives.
Snooker followers in Ireland will be hoping that should the tournament return to Manchester, a city which hosted the championships on numeruous occasions before Sheffield took over, it would open up a slot in the calendar for the return of a WST event to the Republic.
While Belfast continues to host the popular Northern Ireland Open each October, there hasn’t been a ranking event elsewhere in Ireland since Galway’s Bailey Allen Hall hosted 2013 PTC Grand Final.
Manchester currently hosts the Tour Championship event, a slimmed down tournament featuring the world’s top-12 ranked players, according to the one-year ranking list. Previously, the Irish Masters would have been played in the same late March slot in the calendar, with Goffs as its venue for over two decades before the Citywest Hotel hosted the last five runnings.
The Crucible has provided memorable Irish sporting moments, with Alex Higgins, Dennis Taylor and Ken Doherty each triumphing there in 1982, 1985 and 1997 respectively.
In a separate development, snooker chiefs are yet to make a decision on the future of the Saudi Arabia Masters, which is scheduled to take place in Jeddah in October, but is in doubt due to ongoing hostilities in the Middle East.