THE YEAR THE WORLD POOL CHAMPIONSHIP GREW UP

When Fedor Gorst hopped up on the grey clothed table top as the 2025 World Pool Champion, it signaled a transitive moment for the sport. Gorst had just cashed in on $250,000 of the $1 million prize fund, lifting the sport’s pinnacle title to new levels in terms of reward, status and legitimacy.

It’s been a long and sometimes uneven road.

Established by the World Pool Association (WPA) and first contested in Bergheim, Germany, in 1990, the World Pool Championship (also known as the World 9-Ball Championship) has gone through several iterations over the years. In the early years of the fledgling WPA, the World Championship was the first true gathering of top players from every corner of the world, but while the competition was top-level, the title was largely ceremonial (first prize topped out at a meager $17,500) and largely unseen through the ’90s.

All that changed in 1999 for two reasons: Barry Hearn and Efren Reyes.

With the WPA scheduled to stage its “official” World 9-Ball Championship in a hotel ballroom in Alicante Spain in December of that year, British promoter Barry Hearn had his own idea — a World Professional Pool Championship (which was, in fact, WPA-sanctioned) in Cardiff, Wales, promoted and produced by Matchroom and aired live in the United Kingdom and around the world by Sky Sports.

A 96-player field was filled by the WPA (64 players) and Matchroom (32 wildcards) and Sky Sports committed $250,000 to the prize fund, with a then-record $60,000 going to the winner. Through the nine-day event, Sky broadcast 80 hours of live coverage, making it the most widely viewed live pool event ever.

A wild departure from the bench bleachers and pipe-and-drape treatment pool fans had been used to in the U.S. and abroad, the staging in the Cardiff Arena was lightyears ahead, with a main arena set that looked like it had been lifted from the Star Trek USS Enterprise and an interview studio that peered out over the main table. The set, staging and production costs were reportedly $500,000, unheard of for the time.

With Matchroom doing what it does best, Reyes obliged by doing what he does best.

A virtuoso performance by the 45-year-old pool legend through what was likely the strongest international assemblage of pool talent ever delivered a product that showed ardent and neophyte pool viewers alike how exciting the game could be when it was promoted, produced and played at its highest level.

The semifinals was a tasty affair, featuring a Taiwanese duel between 1993 World Champion Fong Pang Chao and money match ace Hoa-Ping Chang, followed by a marquee matchup of Filipino legends pitting Reyes against protégé Francisco Bustamante. Both matches were television gold.

And, of course, the finale was a showcase for pool’s most beloved idol. Reyes cruised to a 17-8 win to claim the World Professional Pool Championship.

Years later, Reyes reflected on the importance of that title, saying that the 1999 World Professional Pool Championship was the most impactful title of his career.

“That is the real world championship,” Reyes told me in an interview. “That world championship is what made me popular in the Philippines. I didn’t know it was going to be such a big thing. I only know how to play pool and win. Before that, I won mostly in the United States, but nobody outside the United States knows me. But after this, they know. Everybody all over the world, they know. That event makes pool popular everywhere.”

The 1999 World Professional Pool Championship springboarded the sport and, under Matchroom’s control, continued to grow for the next eight years before the economic crash of the late 2000s caused sponsorship dollars to dry up. After a two-year hiatus, the WPA once again took the events reins, staging the World 9-Ball Championship in the Middle East before Matchroom once again assumed control in 2022.

As all pool fans know, this ultimately led to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia—working alongside the Saudi Arabian Billiard & Snooker Federation and under the supervision of the Ministry of Sport—committing to sponsor and host the World Pool Championship through 2033, once again elevating both the event and the sport to new heights.

Pool fans will never forget Gorst’s epic battle with Eklent Kaci in the finale of the 2024 World Championship, with pool’s biggest (to date) prize hanging in the balance. But I will always remember the 1999 classic in Cardiff as the event’s coming out party.

Mike Panozzo
Author