13.12.08

NEW FACE

Eagle eyed viewers may have noticed a new face at the Maplin UK Championship in Telford today - Olivier Marteel, the referee for the Ryan Day v Matthew Stevens match.

The 39 year-old Belgian has been a ref since 1994 but has only recently started officiating in the professional ranks and this was his first television appearance.

And he did very well. He was probably nervous beforehand but handled the occasion in a very professional manner.

Commentating for British Eurosport, Mike Hallett and myself each gave two thumbs up for the Gent from Ghent as Rob Walker will almost certainly start calling him.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Or the Belgian Ball Buffer
or 'nerves of steel - Olivier Marteel'

And he only refs short matches so he can get extended rest.

And so on.

Anonymous said...

"New Face" - when I say the heading I thought you were talking about someone new in the crowd!

apart from the Ronnie match the games I have seen on TV have had row upon row of empty seats.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

"New Face" - when I say the heading I thought you were talking about someone new in the crowd!

apart from the Ronnie match the games I have seen on TV have had row upon row of empty seats.




And who would be surprised. Out of the Sunday papers I read today, 2 have no mention of snooker whatsoever (including the results page), and 1 only had a small write-up about Ronnie which excluded the word 'Maplin'.

Bet Maplin love this new arrangement with the press eh?

As I have posted on other threads......

A bunch of imbeciles !

Anonymous said...

Anon (3:40 PM) wrote:

... a small write-up about Ronnie which excluded the word 'Maplin' ...

Interesting point on sponsor/media relationships here: is it a journalist's task to name (e.g. promote) the commercial partner of a sporting event? If he calls it just the UK Championship, all his readers exactly know which tournament it is. So from a journalistic point of view there is no need for the independent press here to name the sponsor other than to please that sponsor an, therefore, the event organizers.

cheers,
Eric

Dave H said...

I always use the sponsor's name. There's no reason not to - they are putting money into the game after all.

Anonymous said...

We have a picture of Olivier on our Global Snooker Centre gallery, a study in concentration

Anonymous said...

Dave H said...

I always use the sponsor's name. There's no reason not to - they are putting money into the game after all.





And why not? It can only help the sport.

What is more concerning is the lack of ANY coverage (certainly in the papers I read).

Is'nt this the new portfolio/project of World Snooker?

Anonymous said...

Maybe those who didn't fill the empty seats at Telford and those who don't care if they read about it in their morning papers are one and the same?

And there seems to be a lot of them!