HOME





1979 Pot Black
The 1979 Pot Black was a professional invitational snooker tournament, which was held in the Pebble Mill Studios in Birmingham. 8 players were competing in 2 four player groups. All matches were one-frame shoot-outs except the final which was played in the best of 3 frames on a one-hour programme. Broadcasts were on BBC2 and started at 21:00 on Friday 29 December 1978 Alan Weeks presented the programme with Ted Lowe as commentator and Sydney Lee as referee. This tournament had the TV debut of Steve Davis who played veteran namesake Fred Davis on the programme transmitted 19 January and won the frame 83-23 but failed to reach the semi-finals. The first Pot Black champion Ray Reardon regained the title 10 years after his first beating reigning champion Doug Mountjoy Douglas James Mountjoy (8 June 1942 – 14 February 2021) was a Welsh snooker player from Tir-y-Berth, Gelligaer, Wales. He was a member of the professional snooker circuit from the late 1970s and througho ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Pebble Mill Studios
Pebble Mill Studios was the BBC's television studio complex located in Edgbaston, Birmingham, England, United Kingdom, which served as the headquarters for BBC Birmingham from 1971 until 2004. The nine-acre site was opened by Princess Anne on 10 June 1971, and in addition to the studios contained two canteens, a post office, gardens, a seven-storey office block, and an outside broadcasting (OB) base. As well as being the home of '' Midlands Today'' and BBC Radio WM, programmes produced at Pebble Mill included '' Pebble Mill at One'', ''The Archers'', '' Top Gear'', '' Doctors'', '' Telly Addicts'', '' Howards' Way'', '' Juliet Bravo'' and '' Gardeners' World''. Pebble Mill Studios closed in 2004 and was demolished in September 2005; BBC Birmingham is now located in The Mailbox shopping complex in Birmingham city centre. Early history In the 1950s, BBC Midlands was based in offices on Carpenter Road, Edgbaston. The news studio was in a separate building in Broad Street, ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Ted Lowe
Edwin Charles Ernest Lowe (1 November 19201 May 2011) was an English snooker commentator for the BBC and ITV. His husky, hushed tones earned him the nickname "Whispering Ted". Life and career Born in Lambourn, Berkshire, Lowe was general manager of London's Leicester Square Hall, the home of professional billiards and snooker. He got his break one day when the BBC's regular commentator, Raymond Glendenning, was suffering from laryngitis. Because there was no commentary box, Lowe spoke in a whisper, which became his trademark. Lowe became the commentator for the snooker television show ''Pot Black'' in 1969 and went on to become the "voice of snooker" and led the commentary in many tournaments. He also commentated in what is generally regarded as snooker's greatest final, that between Steve Davis and Dennis Taylor in the 1985 World Snooker Championship. Lowe occasionally uttered a gaffe on air; one of his most famous quotes being "and for those of you who are watching in black ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Perrie Mans
Pierre "Perrie" Mans (25 October 1940 – 13 September 2023) was a South African professional snooker player. He first won the South African Professional Championship in 1965 and lifted the title 20 times. Mans won the Benson & Hedges Masters in 1979 and reached the final of the World Championship in 1978. Background Mans' father, Peter Mans, who died in 1975, was also a professional snooker player, making the quarter-finals of the 1950 World Snooker Championship. Snooker career Mans won the South African Amateur Championship in 1960, the only occasion in which he competed in the event. He then turned professional and took the South African Professional Championship from Fred Van Rensburg in 1965. Mans first entered the World Snooker Championship in 1970. His first victory in the Championship came in the 1973 event when he defeated Ron Gross 9–2 before losing 8–16 to Eddie Charlton. However, in 1974, he pulled off a major surprise by defeating John Spencer 15� ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Graham Miles
Graham Miles (11 May 1941 – 12 October 2014) was an English snooker player. Career Miles turned professional in 1971. He first gained recognition in 1974, when he reached the final of the World Championship, losing 12–22 to Ray Reardon. As he was left-eye dominant, the right-handed Miles developed an idiosyncratic sighting style with his cue crossing his chin on the left side. This style became more pronounced over time, to the point where the cue ran beneath his left ear. Miles became one of the best known players in Britain, in an era when there was little televised snooker other than the ''Pot Black'' series. He won this tournament at his first attempt in 1974 (after entering as a late replacement for Fred Davis, who withdrew because of illness) and again in 1975. Other notable moments in his career included reaching the final of the 1976 Masters, where he again lost to Reardon. The 1978/79 season saw something of a purple patch for Miles. At the 1978 UK Championship ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Eddie Charlton
Edward Francis Charlton (31 October 1929 – 7 November 2004) was an Australian professional snooker and billiards player. He remains the only player to have been world championship runner-up in both snooker and billiards without winning either title. He later became a successful marketer of sporting goods, launching a popular brand of billiard room equipment bearing his name. Early life Charlton was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia and came from a sporting family. His grandfather ran a billiards club in Swansea, New South Wales, and Charlton began playing cue sports when he was nine years old. At the age of eleven, he defeated fellow Australian Walter Lindrum in a wartime snooker exhibition match, and he made his first century break when he was seventeen. He was involved in numerous other sports during his youth: he was a first-grade footballer and played in the Australian First Division Football (soccer) for ten years; he was a champion surfer, and played ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


John Spencer (snooker Player)
John Spencer (18 September 1935 – 11 July 2006) was an English professional snooker player. One of the most dominant players of the 1970s, he won the World Snooker Championship three times, in 1969, 1971 and 1977. He worked as a snooker commentator for the BBC from 1978 to 1998 and served for 25 years on the board of the sport's governing body, the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA), including a stint as chairman from 1990 until his retirement from the board in 1996. Born in Radcliffe, Lancashire, Spencer started playing snooker on a full-sized table at age 14 and compiled his first century break aged 15. He was conscripted for National Service at age 18 and lost interest in playing snooker for over ten years before taking it up again in 1964. He reached the final of the English Amateur Championship for three years in a row, claiming the title at his third attempt in 1966. He turned professional in 1967—the same year as his amateur rivals Gar ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


1969 Pot Black
The 1969 Pot Black event was the first edition of the professional invitational snooker tournament, which was broadcast in July, August and September 1969. This first recording of ''Pot Black'' took place at the BBC TV Studios in Gosta Green, Birmingham, a converted turn-of-the-century cinema. Later it was recorded at the new Pebble Mill Studios in Birmingham which replaced the Gosta Green Studios. The event featured eight professional players. All matches were one-frame shoot-outs. Broadcasts were on BBC2, starting with an introductory programme at 8:50 pm on Wednesday 23 July 1969. The first match, between John Spencer and Jackie Rea, was broadcast on 30 July, followed by weekly broadcasts until the final on 10 September. The programmes were presented by Keith Macklin with Ted Lowe as the commentator. Ray Reardon Raymond Reardon (8 October 1932 – 19 July 2024) was a Welsh professional snooker player who dominated the sport in the 1970s, winning the W ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Fred Davis (snooker Player)
Fred Davis (14 August 1913 – 16 April 1998) was an English professional player of snooker and English billiards. He was an eight-time World Snooker Championship winner from 1948 to 1956, and a two-time winner of the World Billiards Championship. He was the brother of 15-time world snooker champion Joe Davis; the pair were the only two players to win both snooker and English billiards world championships, and Fred is second on the list of those holding most world snooker championship titles, behind Joe. Davis' professional career started in 1929 at the age of 15 as a billiards player. He competed in his first world snooker championship in 1937 and reached the final three years later, losing to Joe by 36–37. From 1947, Davis played in five straight finals against Scottish player Walter Donaldson, winning three. When the event merged into the World Professional Match-play Championship in 1952, Davis won five more championships, defeating Donaldson three times and then John ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Steve Davis
Steve Davis (born 22 August 1957) is an English retired professional snooker player who is currently a Sports commentator, commentator, DJ, electronic musician and author. He dominated professional snooker in the 1980s, when he reached eight World Snooker Championship finals in nine years, won six world titles and held the List of world number one snooker players, world number one ranking for seven consecutive seasons. He won 28 ranking titles during his career, placing him fifth on the List of snooker players by number of ranking titles, all-time list, behind Ronnie O'Sullivan (41), Stephen Hendry (36), John Higgins (33) and Judd Trump (30). The first player to make an officially recognised maximum break in professional competition, at the 1982 Classic (snooker), 1982 Classic, he was also the first to earn £1 million in career prize money. He is the only snooker player to have won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award, which he received in 1988. Davis became w ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Sydney Lee (snooker Player)
Sydney Raphael Lee (25 April 1910 – 10 November 1986) was an English professional billiards and snooker player. He was four times a quarter-finalist in the World Snooker Championship during the first half of the twentieth century. He was a snooker referee on ''Pot Black''. He was the game consultant for a 1970 episode of ''Steptoe and Son'' entitled "Pot Black" and, as well as performing a number of trick shots was the stand-in for many of the more difficult regular shots seen in the show. Career Lee enjoyed considerable success as an amateur billiards player. He won the boys championship in May 1925 but lost to Reggie Gartland in the 1926 event. The winner of the boys championship was presented with the "Harry Lee Challenge Cup", which had been donated by his father. He was also runner-up in the English Amateur Billiards Championship in 1929 and won it 4 times in succession from 1931 to 1934. He was runner-up in the Empire Billiards Championship in Sydney in 1931 and win ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Alan Weeks
Alan Frederick Weeks (8 September 1923 – 11 June 1996) was an English television sports reporter and commentator for the BBC from 1951 to 1996. He was assigned to work as the publicity manager of the Brighton Sports Stadium after he was demobbed from the Royal Naval Reserve in 1946. Three years later, Weeks was discovered by BBC Television outside broadcast producer Peter Dimmock and joined the corporation as a regular sports commentator in 1951. He covered more than 30 sports for the BBC such as ice skating, ice hockey, swimming, gymnastics, football, snooker, the Summer Olympic Games, the Winter Olympic Games and the Commonwealth Games until his retirement in 1996. Weeks was the first director of the Sports Aid Foundation between 1976 and 1983, later serving as an elected governor of the foundation. Early life and war service Weeks was born on 8 September 1923 in Bristol, the son of the Captain Frederick Charles Weeks and his wife Ada Frances Weeks. His family moved to ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the List of English districts by population, largest local authority district in England by population and the second-largest city in Britain – commonly referred to as the second city of the United Kingdom – with a population of million people in the city proper in . Birmingham borders the Black Country to its west and, together with the city of Wolverhampton and towns including Dudley and Solihull, forms the West Midlands conurbation. The royal town of Sutton Coldfield is incorporated within the city limits to the northeast. The urban area has a population of 2.65million. Located in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands region of England, Birmingham is considered to be the social, cultural, financial and commercial centre of the Midland ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]