Potted history of an unseemly cycle of hate

There have been splits in snooker before. Back in the mid-Eighties, Steve Davis's Matchroom Mob in association with Chas and Dave released Snooker Loopy - who can entirely rid themselves of the memory of Terry Griffiths singing 'If I win I'll celebrate and buy another eight hairbrushes for me barnet'? - and the rival camp, Higgins and White, retaliated with a rather lame effort. The Matchroom Mob cleaned up, but, more importantly, everybody had a laugh. This time it's more serious.

On Wednesday, The Sportsmasters Network invited 30 top players, including Stephen Hendry, Ronnie O'Sullivan and Mark Williams, to a meeting in Glasgow to discuss plans for their new tour. Gerry Sinclair, the managing director, claims that 22 of the top 32 players are already committed and, of the remaining 10, only John Higgins is committed to the World Snooker Aassociation.

'By the end of February,' says Sinclair, 'I'll be disappointed if we haven't got 28 to 30 of the top 32.' Hendry commented: 'This is the way forward for snooker and I'm delighted that so many players seem interested in playing on it.' A Packer-style revolution is in the air.

All the ingredients are there. First, it has been a poor decade for snooker. There has been chronic mismanagement and the stench of sleaze has attached itself to the game.

One former chairman of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association, Geoff Foulds, recently lost a libel action to The Mirror, who had accused him of big-time fiddling of expenses. Another chairman of the WPBSA, Rex Williams, is awaiting the publication of a report into his activities.

Second, there is a need for change. In 2003, tobacco sponsorship, other than the Embassy world championship, must come to an end. If sponsorship falls off, prize money will decline. Third, everyone hates each other's guts. The sport that was once on the cusp of going global has been reduced to a village of the damned.

Feuds proliferate. Grudges are so deeply embedded as to be irremovable. Even that old maxim that one's enemy's enemy is one's friend no longer carries weight. Here one's enemy's enemy is one's enemy... A hates B who hates C whom A also hates, though for different reasons than B. C, obviously, hates everyone.

In such a paranoid environment it can become difficult to see clearly, but, in short, this seems to be the state of play. Ian Doyle, who manages Hendry, Williams, O'Sullivan and the rest, has become increasingly dismayed by the way the game has been run.

He set up TSN, which bought Cuemasters, his snooker arm as it were, and received backing from Warburg Pincus. They approached the WPBSA, now the WSA, although known as World Snooker. Sinclair, who was formerly Doyle's lawyer, says: 'The more the negotiations progressed the clearer it became that they had neither the ability nor the willingness to stem the decline.' Matters deteriorated.

Sinclair says of the WSA: 'We don't want your business acumen, you don't have any. We don't want your reputation, it's crap. We don't want your ability to organise tournaments. All we want is the players.' And, bar John Higgins, who has signed a three-year deal with the WSA worth £225,000 to market the game, they appear to have most of the main men onside. Sure, they may not have Paul Hunter yet. But, then again, who's Paul Hunter?

The WSA, meanwhile, point out that they are a non-profit making organisation in contrast to TSN, who will have to make profits for their investors. They say they can guarantee prize money of £6.9 million - potentially extremely good news for Paul Hunter - in contrast to TSN 'whose failure to put any meat on the bones only strengthens the case for players to continue supporting World Snooker'.

Bruce Beckett from that organisation says: 'Our tour is in place. As far as we're concerned it's business as usual.' Before going on to concede 'that at some stage we will need to know who's playing'.

Both sides claim to be in discussion with the BBC. And, refreshing to relate, both are telling the truth. 'We are talking to all parties and trying to find a resolution,' says a BBC spokesperson. 'Quite what that will be is open to debate.'

And crucial to the debate will be the BBC's experience with darts. They really don't want to find themselves covering tournaments contested by nonentities, broadcasting the snooker equivalent of Bobby George parroting on about so and so being the best in the world when we all know it is Phil Taylor not so and so. They have recently signed a contract with the WSA, which enables them to guarantee the prize money but which will surely contain a clause saying such monies are dependent on the top stars appearing. No show, no dough.

But then who are the top players? The ones who head the WSA rankings, the WSA would say. The ones who used to head the WSA rankings, TSN would say. The debate will go on and on and on. It can only be resolved by a BBC-brokered peace between the parties - which is unlikely - or by the players.

Given Doyle's involvement, it seems inevitable his charges will support his breakaway. A further advantage for TSN is that their internet operation is running (four a half million hits a month and rising, including many from Mongolia).

For a long time, snooker has been played by young men and run by old men. Now young men can decide which bunch of old men they want to run their game.