Emily Frazier's quotes in Billiards Digest. I'm guessing these were from much earlier this year as the event schedule does not match what happened this year (i.e. European Open). It's interesting how quickly they've backed away from these statements.
What does the future of the WPA look like relative to the future of the Matchroom 9-ball tour?
We certainly don't want to be involved with federations and player standings, etc. Also, in creating transparency for things like the invitational events and Mosconi Cup, there needs to be that independent structure overseeing things. We hope that as this grows, and in three years' time we've doubled the calendar and doubled the prize money, the WPA will grow stronger as well through sanctioning. We want to make sure going forward that there are press releases on their web site and more social media activity. To do all that we have to work together. I've set up the right communications between my team and the WPA's team to ensure that things like that are actually going to happen moving forward.
Do you see Matchroom playing a role in the restructuring of the WPA to the point that it has the capabilities and funding and staff to do all those things, like you did with World Snooker and the WPBSA?
The sport needs the WPA. I don't know if we want to be part of a restructuring. But anything that would help the game evolve, we would want to be involved within that change. We don't want to be the governing body, but we want to help ensure that there is a good governing body in place. The good thing about our events now, like the World Pool Masters and the World Cup of Pool, is that they are set up with entry requirements, so we've now given the WPA allocations for the spots. They share those with the member federations. Now, all of a sudden, that gives more structure for everyone instead of us just handing out invitations and having players worry about how people are selected. I don't really know where it's all going to go. Right now, we're just staying in communication and seeing what can be done. We're just starting to implement this structure in our events and rankings now, so to get involved in some kind of restructuring of the WPA would be getting ahead of ourselves. The movement of the sport will naturally help or force the WPA to restructure to be more effective and keep up with the sport.
Will promoters that want to hitch their events onto the ranking bandwagon be required to be WPA sanctioned?
Yes, as of 2023. It's too last-minute to enforce that in 2022. There are still so many unknowns, so we didn't want to set up too many hurdles for the promoters. And Ian [Anderson] and the WPA understood that.