Matchroom Sport

Matchroom Sport is a sport event promotions company led by the founder and owner English entrepreneur Barry Hearn and his son Eddie. It first came to attention in the sports of snooker and boxing and is also involved in pool, bowling, golf (see PGA EuroPro Tour), fishing, darts, ping pong, and poker. The company is based in Brentwood, Essex.^[1]

Recently, it also began sponsoring the football ground of English League One team Leyton Orient. Previously called Brisbane Road, it has now been renamed the Matchroom Stadium. Barry Hearn is Orient's Chairman.

Cue sports

After many years of snooker event management, Matchroom Sport is currently the official sponsor of the annual WPA World Nine-ball Championship, the most prestigious professional tournament of its field. After having organised a similar but competing event for one year, the World Professional Pool Championship in Cardiff, Wales, in July 1999, Matchroom merged its tournament with that of the World Pool-Billiard Association in 2000, and the joint event took the promotional name "World Pool Championship" (an ambiguous name, since there is also a yearly WPA World Eight-ball Championship held in the United Arab Emirates). The event stayed in Cardiff until 2003, with the 2004 and 2005 events taking place in Taiwan. The 2006 event was held in the Philippines. Despite the moves, the competition has remained very similar in format and staging throughout.

Matchroom's other prestigious pool event is the Mosconi Cup, held each December from 1994 onwards. The event is modelled on the Ryder Cup, and it pits a team of European players against a team from the US. From 2003, the event has alternated between European and American venues, having previous always been held in the UK.

The Mosconi Cup is notable for having evolved from an exhibition event in the early years, into a genuinely prestigious tournament. Early Mosconi Cup contests were characterised by a team of some of America’s most charismatic players taking on a European team of mainly British snooker players, in an attempt to promote nine-ball in the UK. More recent instances of the event have been fought in a much more serious manner, although the raucous crowd atmosphere has been retained, making it unique among cue sports competitions.

Ten-pin bowling

Matchroom has been involved in a revival of the sport of ten-pin bowling which has given the sport a renewed international pop-culture interest.

With a roster of the world's three major bowling events – the World Tenpin Masters, the Weber Cup and the AMF World Cup – Matchroom Sport has established a successful formula for presenting televised bowling. All three events are presented by broadcasters Nick Halling and Cass Edwards.

Matchroom Sport offers free tickets to the World Tenpin Masters. They are also distributed by the British Tenpin Bowling Association for free.

Boxing

Current Stable

Incomplete

Boxer	Nationality	Weight	Signed	Title
Ryan Aston	English	Middleweight		N/A
Tommy Coyle	English	Lightweight	27-11-2013	N/A
Darren Hamilton	English	Light Welterweight	27-11-2013	N/A
Nathan Cleverly	Welsh	Cruiserweight	27-03-2014	N/A
Tony Bellew	English	Light Heavyweight		Commonwealth Light Heavyweight Champion
Kell Brook	English	Welterweight	08-04-2011	IBF Welterweight World Champion
Ricky Burns	Scottish	Lightweight	11-03-2013	N/A
James Degale	English	Super Middleweight		N/A
Wadi Camacho	English	Cruiserweight	2013	N/A
Luke Campbell	English	lightweight	23-04-2013	N/A
Scott Cardle	English	Lightweight	30-01-2012	Central Area Lightweight Champion
Anthony Crolla	English	Lightweight	17-09-2013	WBO Inter-Continental lightweight title
Rocky Fielding	English	Super Middleweight	06-06-2012	Commonwealth Super Middleweight Champion
Carl Froch	English	Super Middleweight	04-03-2011	WBA Super Middleweight World Champion IBF Super Middleweight World Champion
Charlie Flynn	Scottish	Lightweight		N/A
Anthony Joshua	English	Heavyweight	24-07-2013	WBC International Heavyweight Champion
Ricky Boylan^[2]	English	Light Welterweight	08/01/2014
Kevin Mitchell	English	Lightweight	28-05-2013	N/A
Erick Ochieng	English	Light Middleweight		N/A
Grzegorz Proksa	Polish	Middleweight		N/A
Lee Purdy	English	Welterweight		N/A
Scott Quigg	English	Super Bantamweight	12-06-2013	WBA Super Bantamweight World Champion
Brian Rose	English	Light Middleweight	24-01-2013	N/A
John Ryder	English	Middleweight		N/A
Lee Selby	Welsh	Featherweight	13-03-2013	British Featherweight Champion Commonwealth Featherweight Champion
Callum Smith	English	Super Middleweight	03-10-2012	English Super Middleweight Champion
Stephen Smith	English	Super Featherweight	10-10-2013	British Super Featherweight Champion
Robbie Davies Jnr	English	Light Welterweight	09-01-2014	N/A
Martin J. Ward	English	Lightweight	31-05-2012	N/A
Khalid Yafai	English	Bantamweight	14-05-2012	N/A

References