Snooker on The Box

It's a week to go until the UK Championships, and also 2 weeks to go until Snooker's back on the BBC. The BBC Tournaments (Grand Prix, UK, Masters, Welsh, Worlds) are always the most exciting and the best to watch. BBC's coverage has everything expected, great pundits (sort of), great commentators, and a lovely Big Red Button, letting us viewers choose the matches we want. All matches are televised in one way or another whereas the Eurosport Tournaments (Northern Ireland, Shanghai, China,) leave you with just one match. Meaning you can't watch who you want. 

BBC is obviously better.

However, BBC doesn't have the perfection. Watching the Grand Prix, I noticed the repetition of the videos about players, Scotland, Hotshots, that little kid with glasses. OK, yes, people will want to see these but might be unable to so when they are watching put it on. Also there aren't really many videos about past tournaments, I'm talking about 80's and 90's which is surprising considering the presenters are Steve and Parrot. Compared to Wimbledon, which (thanks a bit to rain) shows tonnes of documentaries featuring Sampras, McEnroe etc.

The commentators are good I suppose, but when this appeared, I was shocked. Clive is one of my favourite commentators but now they've said their gonna ditch him for Ken Doherty. (?) What have the Beeb come to? Are they trying to beat Eurosport by shoving in as many players as possible? Eurosport only have 1, if you count Mike 'Pontins' Hallet as a proper famous player. (No Offense Mike, it's just you've never won the Big One) 

What happens if Steve, John and Ken all qualify? 

Of course there is Eurosport. But it isn't mega rich like it's opponent. Hopefully one day Eurosport will add a studio for presenters, like they've done for the UCI World Cycling Championships and the Superbikes. 

Where does the future lye then? BBC, Eurosport and Sky Sports have all got HD channels now but Snooker somehow avoided getting the High-Definition treatment (come on, we got Yachting in HD!) 

But what interests me the most is will there be a new channel jumping up and snagging some rights to do some tournaments? Is Football and Golf mad Setanta willing to get some Snooker in there? I think Setanta are good enough to get some decent better-than-Eurosport coverage, so lets cross our fingers.

And no ITV, don't try coming back.

Whatever happens, nothing beats some live Snooker on the BBC. Expect me to spend the UK Champs on the sofa, eyes glued to the box. Holt's winning 6-2 against Johal in the Qualifiers with a game against Fergal probable, he's beaten him once this season, lets hope he can do it again and get on the box.