• Home
• Professional
• Cuefacts
• Magazine
• About
• Pontins

• 
• 
• 
• 

Options

• Home

• Latest News

• ONEFORSEVEN

• Professional

• Players

• Rankings

• Cuefacts

• Pontins

• Ladies

• Pro-Ams

• International

• GSM - Online Magazine

• About Global Snooker

2009 Betfred World Snooker Championship

Fan's Eye View with Ryan Watterson

Ryan Watterson is the 13 year old great-nephew of Mike Watterson, a name synonymous with the World Championship at the Crucible. In fact it was Watterson, thanks to an inspired suggestion by his wife, who was instrumental, in his role as a WPBSA Promoter, in bringing the World Snooker Championship to the Crucible in 1977.

Young Ryan, who lives in Sheffield, knows the Crucible like the back of his hand. In fact readers familiar with Facebook may have already seen his photos throughout the winter showing the gradual transformation that the Crucible has been undergoing during its reufrbishment.

So it's over to Ryan for his view of the build up to this year's Betfred.com World Snooker Championship.

My dad and I decided to go over to the Crucible on Friday to have a look at all the preparations being made for the World Championships.

The first thing we decided to do was have a quick look round inside the new look Crucible as I hadn't had a chance to go in yet, although my dad was lucky enough to get in a few weeks ago and he took some photos.

It turned out to be a good decision as the first person we saw in the foyer was John Parrott, who'd also gone to have a look round.

I asked if he mind having a photo taken and, polite as ever, he happily obliged, whilst chatting to my dad about his appearance on Inside Sport last week.

The new Crucible entrance is much bigger than before, as they've taken the old restuarant away, and moved the box office up the stairs to the entrance level. Otherwise it's not that much different.

At the bottom of the stairs is now the Players' Lounge. That space used to house the old Heritage Room, which was really popular with the fans.

I turned round, and there was Stuart Bingham, getting ready to play Ronnie on Saturday morning. He knows my face now as I had a picture with him once before, but he said "Here's another one for the collection". That's my dad in the photo too.

We went back outside into the sunshine and walked over to see how the set up was coming along on the Cuezone tent. The workmen were still busy getting everything in place and ready.

So we walked on over Tudor Square to the Winter Gardens. And there was John Parrott again. This time doing some exhibition shots with Rob Mollier, who is an expert at magic and trick shots.

The shots Rob did were fantastic and amazed the audience and also John Parrott.

We went back for another wander round the Crucible and I was lucky to run into Dennis Taylor, who'd just finished doing an exhibition with Ken Doherty at the new Jury's Hotel. So we had a photo with Dennis, and then with Terry Griffiths and Mark Allen, and they were all really nice and happy to pose with us.

Finally, just as we were going to set off home, we walked past the stage door and were amazed to see Stephen Hendry coming out. And we were lucky because there was no one else around and he was happy to stop and pose for photos with me and with my Dad, who's probably an even bigger fan than me!

So the day ended on a high note, leaving us really excited about coming back to watch the snooker and maybe meet more players and get some photos for my collection.