One of the great myths in sport is the story of the great wave of new fans who are only waiting to start watching, if only we change X,Y,Z. Maybe its a case with all minority sports, but the two I follow most closely, namely snooker & horse racing, both seem to be becoming ever more obsessed with subscribing to this falsehood. Watching British racing from afar, this has lead to a situation where the sport has actually started to slowly eat itself from the inside. Thankfully in snooker we haven't quite reached that level of self-flagellation yet,but after reading some of the comments surrounding the sport in recent times, we can't get too complacent.
Over the last few months it seems everyone in the sport is coming forward with idea's as to what we need to do to open the floodgates to these vast numbers of new fans who are only waiting to come aboard. These have varied from shorter matches, to newer commentators, to shorter matches at the world championship,to a different venue for the world championship & most persistently a change to the dress code, which brings us to this weeks Champion of Champions event in ITV4.
Hinted at in recent weeks & unveiled over the weekend, this matchroom promoted event will see the player don black shiny polo shirts, with their name on the back as well as their nicknames.In a word, these look awful. Since its revival in in 2013 ,The Champion of Champions has quickly established itself as one of the games most prestigious events, but these changes make it look almost tacky.
This is not to say I'm against everything that isn't a waistcoat & bow-tie , I think the open neck black shirts the use for Home Nations events are casual without looking scruffy & the named polo shirts they wear in the shoot out suit that event,
My real question here is to what purpose are these been changes made? If its it to give the event its own separate identity, then it might achieve that (,but not in the way they hope).it could also be designed to catch the eye of the casual punter flicking through the channels by looking less formal . or it may even be a marketing ploy that hopes to see young snooker fans going online to buy replicas of their favourite players.Whatever the thinking behind it, for me it misses the mark.
Apparently Judd Trump was part of the consultation process on this, Judd has been one of the most vocal of the sport participants when it had come to airing his views on things in the sport over the last year & whereas I would disagree with him in almost everything he has suggested, I do accept its all coming from a good place & a genuine desire to to see the sport grow.As far as I'm concerned though ,both he & the governing body are barking up the wrong tree with this.
The irony is, for all we hear about the stuffy old formal wear turning people away from the sport, I have seen in my own club on many occasions the excitement & pride on the faces of the junior members when they are fitted for their club waistcoats for the first time.They see it as snooker uniform & something to work towards. I don't think a shiny club polo shirt would carry the same gravitas.
Ultimately of course this week will be judged & remembered by what we see on the table ,not by what the players are wearing, but we can't get complacent about what makes our sport so special. If we go too far down the road of dumbing it down, we not only run the risk of not attracting new fans,but also alienating the ones we already have.
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