Matchroom Sport
Encyclopedia
Matchroom Sport is a sport event promotions company founded by the English
entrepreneur
Barry Hearn
. It first came to attention in the sports of snooker
and boxing
and is also involved in pool
, bowling
, golf
(see PGA EuroPro Tour
), fishing
, darts
and poker
. The company is based in Brentwood, Essex
.
Recently, it also began sponsoring the football ground of English League One team Leyton Orient. Previously called Brisbane Road, it has now been renamed the Matchroom Stadium
. Barry Hearn
is Orient's Chairman.
, the most prestigious professional tournament of its field. After having organised a similar but competing event for one year, the World Professional Pool Championship in Cardiff
, Wales
, in July 1999, Matchroom merged its tournament with that of the World Pool-Billiard Association
in 2000, and the joint event took the promotional name "World Pool Championship" (an ambiguous name, since there is also a yearly WPA World Eight-ball Championship
held in the United Arab Emirates
). The event stayed in Cardiff until 2003, with the 2004 and 2005 events taking place in Taiwan
. The 2006 event was held in the Philippines
. Despite the moves, the competition has remained very similar in format and staging throughout.
Matchroom's other prestigious pool event is the Mosconi Cup
, held each December from 1994 onwards. The event is modelled on the Ryder Cup
, and it pits a team of Europe
an players against a team from the US
. From 2003, the event has alternated between European and American venues, having previous always been held in the UK
.
The Mosconi Cup is notable for having evolved from an exhibition
event in the early years, into a genuinely prestigious tournament. Early Mosconi Cup contests were characterised by a team of some of America’s most charisma
tic players taking on a European team of mainly British
snooker
players, in an attempt to promote nine-ball in the UK. More recent instances of the event have been fought in a much more serious manner, although the raucous crowd atmosphere has been retained, making it unique among cue sports competitions.
which has given the sport a renewed international pop-culture interest.
With a roster of the world's three major bowling events – the World Tenpin Masters
, the Weber Cup
and the AMF World Cup
– Matchroom Sport has established a successful formula for presenting televised bowling. All three events are presented by broadcasters Nick Halling
and Cass Edwards
.
Matchroom Sport offers free tickets to the World Tenpin Masters. They are also distributed by the British Tenpin Bowling Association
for free.
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
entrepreneur
Entrepreneur
An entrepreneur is an owner or manager of a business enterprise who makes money through risk and initiative.The term was originally a loanword from French and was first defined by the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon. Entrepreneur in English is a term applied to a person who is willing to...
Barry Hearn
Barry Hearn
Barry Hearn is an English sporting events promoter, and the founder and chairman of promotions company Matchroom Sport. He is currently the chairman of Leyton Orient F.C., and the Professional Darts Corporation and was also until July 2010 chairman of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker...
. It first came to attention in the sports of snooker
Snooker
Snooker is a cue sport that is played on a green baize-covered table with pockets in each of the four corners and in the middle of each of the long side cushions. A regular table is . It is played using a cue and snooker balls: one white , 15 worth one point each, and six balls of different :...
and boxing
Boxing
Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
and is also involved in pool
Pocket billiards
Pool, also more formally known as pocket billiards or pool billiards , is the family of cue sports and games played on a pool table having six receptacles called pockets along the , into which balls are deposited as the main goal of play. Popular versions include eight-ball and nine-ball...
, bowling
Bowling
Bowling Bowling Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule...
, golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
(see PGA EuroPro Tour
PGA EuroPro Tour
The PGA EuroPro Tour is a men's developmental professional golf tour. It was created in 2002 by the merger of two older development tours, the EuroPro Tour and the PGA Mastercard Tour. It is based mainly in the United Kingdom, with a few events in other countries...
), fishing
Fishing
Fishing is the activity of trying to catch wild fish. Fish are normally caught in the wild. Techniques for catching fish include hand gathering, spearing, netting, angling and trapping....
, darts
Darts
Darts is a form of throwing game where darts are thrown at a circular target fixed to a wall. Though various boards and games have been used in the past, the term "darts" usually now refers to a standardised game involving a specific board design and set of rules...
and poker
Poker
Poker is a family of card games that share betting rules and usually hand rankings. Poker games differ in how the cards are dealt, how hands may be formed, whether the high or low hand wins the pot in a showdown , limits on bet sizes, and how many rounds of betting are allowed.In most modern poker...
. The company is based in Brentwood, Essex
Brentwood, Essex
Brentwood is a town and the principal settlement of the Borough of Brentwood, in the county of Essex in the east of England. It is located in the London commuter belt, 20 miles east north-east of Charing Cross in London, and near the M25 motorway....
.
Recently, it also began sponsoring the football ground of English League One team Leyton Orient. Previously called Brisbane Road, it has now been renamed the Matchroom Stadium
Matchroom Stadium
Brisbane Road, currently referred to as the Matchroom Stadium for sponsorship purposes and originally known as Osborne Road, is a football stadium in Brisbane Road, Leyton, east London, England. It has been the home ground of Leyton Orient F.C. since 1937, prior to which it was the home of amateur...
. Barry Hearn
Barry Hearn
Barry Hearn is an English sporting events promoter, and the founder and chairman of promotions company Matchroom Sport. He is currently the chairman of Leyton Orient F.C., and the Professional Darts Corporation and was also until July 2010 chairman of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker...
is Orient's Chairman.
Cue sports
After many years of snooker event management, Matchroom Sport is currently the official sponsor of the annual WPA World Nine-ball ChampionshipWPA World Nine-ball Championship
The WPA World Nine-ball Championship is an annual, international, professional nine-ball pool tournament, founded in 1990, sanctioned by the World Pool-Billiard Association , and principally sponsored and organised by Matchroom Sport...
, the most prestigious professional tournament of its field. After having organised a similar but competing event for one year, the World Professional Pool Championship in Cardiff
Cardiff
Cardiff is the capital, largest city and most populous county of Wales and the 10th largest city in the United Kingdom. The city is Wales' chief commercial centre, the base for most national cultural and sporting institutions, the Welsh national media, and the seat of the National Assembly for...
, Wales
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
, in July 1999, Matchroom merged its tournament with that of the World Pool-Billiard Association
World Pool-Billiard Association
The World Pool-Billiard Association is the international governing body for pocket billiards . The group was formed in 1987, and was initially headed by a provisional board of directors consisting of representatives from Japan, the United States, Sweden, and Germany...
in 2000, and the joint event took the promotional name "World Pool Championship" (an ambiguous name, since there is also a yearly WPA World Eight-ball Championship
WPA World Eight-ball Championship
The WPA World Eight-ball Championship is a professional eight-ball pocket billiards tournament held in Fujairah, United Arab Emirates, and sanctioned by the World Pool-Billiard Association. A total of 64 participants compete in the event, which typically has a total prize purse over US$100,000...
held in the United Arab Emirates
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates, abbreviated as the UAE, or shortened to "the Emirates", is a state situated in the southeast of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia on the Persian Gulf, bordering Oman, and Saudi Arabia, and sharing sea borders with Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Iran.The UAE is a...
). The event stayed in Cardiff until 2003, with the 2004 and 2005 events taking place in Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
. The 2006 event was held in the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
. Despite the moves, the competition has remained very similar in format and staging throughout.
Matchroom's other prestigious pool event is the Mosconi Cup
Mosconi Cup
The Mosconi Cup is an annual nine-ball pool tournament contested between teams representing Europe and the USA since 1994. The trophy is named after American player Willie Mosconi, and is modeled on and compared to the Ryder Cup in golf...
, held each December from 1994 onwards. The event is modelled on the Ryder Cup
Ryder Cup
The Ryder Cup is a biennial golf competition between teams from Europe and the United States. The competition is jointly administered by the PGA of America and the PGA European Tour, and is contested every two years, the venue alternating between courses in the United States and Europe...
, and it pits a team of Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an players against a team from the US
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. From 2003, the event has alternated between European and American venues, having previous always been held in the UK
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
.
The Mosconi Cup is notable for having evolved from an exhibition
Exhibition game
An exhibition game is a sporting event in which there is no competitive value of any significant kind to any competitor regardless of the outcome of the competition...
event in the early years, into a genuinely prestigious tournament. Early Mosconi Cup contests were characterised by a team of some of America’s most charisma
Charisma
The term charisma has two senses: 1) compelling attractiveness or charm that can inspire devotion in others, 2) a divinely conferred power or talent. For some theological usages the term is rendered charism, with a meaning the same as sense 2...
tic players taking on a European team of mainly British
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...
snooker
Snooker
Snooker is a cue sport that is played on a green baize-covered table with pockets in each of the four corners and in the middle of each of the long side cushions. A regular table is . It is played using a cue and snooker balls: one white , 15 worth one point each, and six balls of different :...
players, in an attempt to promote nine-ball in the UK. More recent instances of the event have been fought in a much more serious manner, although the raucous crowd atmosphere has been retained, making it unique among cue sports competitions.
Ten-pin bowling
Matchroom has been involved in a revival of the sport of ten-pin bowlingTen-pin bowling
Ten-pin bowling is a competitive sport in which a player rolls a bowling ball down a wooden or synthetic lane with the objective of scoring points by knocking down as many pins as possible.-Summary:The lane is bordered along its length by semicylindrical channels Ten-pin bowling (commonly just...
which has given the sport a renewed international pop-culture interest.
With a roster of the world's three major bowling events – the World Tenpin Masters
World Tenpin Masters
The World Tenpin Masters is an annual Ten-pin bowling tournament. It consists of a single lane surrounded by banked seating on both sides to give the event the kind of high-pressure atmosphere that makes the Masters the world’s leading televised bowling tournament.The event is televised by...
, the Weber Cup
Weber Cup
The Weber Cup, named after bowling legend Dick Weber, is the Ten-pin bowling equivalent of Golf's Ryder Cup. It consists of two teams, Team Europe and Team USA competing over three days in a series of singles, doubles and team matches....
and the AMF World Cup
AMF World Cup
The AMF World Cup, now a joint partnership between Qubica and AMF , is an annual Ten-pin bowling championship, and one of the largest in terms of number of participating nations...
– Matchroom Sport has established a successful formula for presenting televised bowling. All three events are presented by broadcasters Nick Halling
Nick Halling
Nick Halling is a British sports broadcaster and journalist. He is a boxing commentator for Sky Sports and presented their American football for 15 years, as well as ice hockey, ten-pin bowling and numerous other events....
and Cass Edwards
Cass Edwards
Cass Edwards is a UK based tenpin bowler turned sports broadcaster and journalist. He is a commentator for Ten-pin bowling and has been doing this for almost 10 years to 2009...
.
Matchroom Sport offers free tickets to the World Tenpin Masters. They are also distributed by the British Tenpin Bowling Association
British Tenpin Bowling Association
The British Tenpin Bowling Association is the official governing body of ten-pin bowling in the United Kingdom. It is the official sanctioning body, recognised by FIQ, the sport's world governing body, for all competitions, leagues and tournaments held in the UK, and is the organisation...
for free.