MEET THE HOTSHOTS: MICHAEL GEORGIOU

Michael Georgiou is...actually, who is Michael Georgiou?

Of all the players chosen for the Hotshots campaign, he is the least known.

Certainly, the BBC website didn’t know much about him when they announced the campaign a couple of weeks ago.

They called him ‘Michael Demetrio.’

Georgiou – and that is his correct name – is actually a fine prospect. Last year, he won the IBSF world under title, previously won by the likes of Ken Doherty, Peter Ebdon and Ronnie O’Sullivan.

It got him on to the ranking tournament circuit but he has so far found life as a professional hard.

From the three tournaments played so far he has won four frames.

Georgiou is finding life off the table pretty tough as well. Despite being termed ‘professionals’, players in the first two rounds of ranking events, including the World Championship, do not receive a single penny.

A few weeks ago, Georgiou gave an interview to the Metro newspaper in which he revealed he had taken a part time bar job and was relying on the financial support of his parents.

This is the harsh reality of life on the lowest rung of the pro snooker ladder. Many players have climbed to lucrative heights; however many others have slipped off altogether.

Georgiou, from Forest Hill in London, is 20 and so has time on his side.

But if he does slip off the main tour this season he will have to spend a year working his way back up from the Pontin’s International Open Series, and this secondary circuit is far more competitive than a lot of people realise.

So the danger is that Georgiou, plucked from the game’s supporting cast to play a starring role in this new PR campaign, could slide back into obscurity.

I hope he doesn’t. Snooker needs young talent to come through.

That he’s won the world junior title and finished runner-up in the European Under 19 Championship proves Georgiou has potential.

If he starts to make good on this, nobody will be getting his name wrong in the future.