The most pampered tables on earth

HERE'S a picture you won't often see; world snooker champion Stuart Bingham potting some balls earlier this week while wearing a T shirt. Indeed York has witnessed quite a few rarely seen moments over the last couple of weeks with the Barbican hosting the UK Championships.

World snooker champion Stuart Bingham practices earlier this week. Picture: Matt Clark

And some of the most significant involve Eugene James.

He may not be a household name like Judd Trump and Mark Selby, but Eugene is probably the most important man here, because his job is to set up the tables. Without him there would be no play.

"Yes there is a pressure," says Eugene. "We are constantly keeping a watchful eye and have two screens to watch the play looking for any roll off or jump."

While the rest of us tune in to see who'll win, he is more interested in how the tables are performing.

But before they can be used in a tournament, the tables are first shipped in from China to be set up at Eugene's workshop near Bristol. Diamond floats are used to fine tune the slates before precision spirit levels help produce the perfect playing surface. It's hours of painstaking work – then he takes them apart again.

"They're quite fragile and don't really like travelling," says Eugene. "Snooker tables like to be put up and left for about 100 years, but ours are up and down all the time, so we have to treat them with care."

Which is easier said than done. Each table has five slates the size of a door and weighing 200 kilos apiece. For the championships Eugene had to bring no fewer than eight tables.

"It's like a big jigsaw," he says. "At each venue we have to start all over again really because these are natural products. The atmosphere changes all the time, so we need to build the tables up gradually over two or three days to let them settle."

Eugene James prepares one of the eight championship tables. Picture: Matt Clark

That means the frame and slates are built first and once they have been levelled are left to acclimatise. On the third day they are dressed in cloth - don't use the word baize please - from Stroud, which for 120 years has made the finest examples.

"This is only produced for tournaments," says Eugene. "The ones in a snooker hall take about six months to bed in, but this has to be the right speed from day one.

So everything is different; from the cushion height to the nap which is a lot finer to get that extra speed."

But that's by no means the end of his work. Eugene is in every day adjusting joints or brushing and ironing the surface. He also changes each table's cloth up to three times a week during the course of the championships.

"The cloth wears out and the balls start jumping and pinging," says Eugene. "Some players treat the tables really nicely, leaving them clean and without many fingerprints."

Others don't.

"We used to call Cliff Thorburn the claw, because he dragged his hands all the way back and lifted the nap up. It must have been murder for his opponents. One small fingerprint can send the ball off, that's why we are brushing the cloth all the time."

Before, after and during the interval to be precise. Low bristles scrub the surface and remove chalk, while longer ones get under the cushions. Then Eugene has a piece of well-worn billiard cloth to lay the nap back down.

Another little known job he carries out is to set the table heater to keep moisture out, because the drier it is the faster it will play.

A thermostat is set to 50 degrees, but once through two inches of slate the temperature drops by half. Eugene says if it gets any hotter the rubber in the cushions will be affected and that will alter the bounce.

It's amazing to think the set up of a snooker table at this level is as precise any Formula One car. But there are many other behind the scenes jobs that are just as important.

Barbican event manager Bridie Wray runs a pool of 90 casual staff and says although every show is different, each one is approached in the same way.

"From relationships with promoters and clients, planning and booking crew the process doesn't change," says Bridie. "The snooker championships is the biggest show in our calendar and we run on adrenalin for a couple of weeks, doing 15 hour days. World snooker uses every inch of the building and it's pretty much open 24/7."

One of those people working long hours is Agi Czerwilska who is responsible for ensuring everything goes swan-like before and during play. This ranges from letting the audience know which games are on to ensuring the players use the correct chair.

Agi Czerwilska. Picture: Matt Clark.

"The rule is the higher ranked sits on the left," says Agi. "Snooker is a small world and we all know each other. The players are super-friendly, it's like a family; a travelling family. Some say we're like a circus."

Barbican head steward Jan Newton-Cowell has been welcoming this circus back to York for many years and says because she's worked here so long, a lot of the punters know her name.

"People always say hello, it's very much a family atmosphere. You don't see that on TV," says Jan. "We get a broad spectrum of people, some travel from China to see their players. and a lot of them are creatures of habit.

"It's always on when the Christmas market is on and one man said to me yesterday I'm watching this while my wife has gone shopping."

Jan says one lad came in on his seventh birthday to see Judd Trump for the first time live. Who knows, in a few years time he might be competing for the trophy.

"Well yes," she says. "That's how they all start."