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Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too powerful?

Postby Witz78

Before i start i will say that i totally commend what On Q Promotions have done with building and establishing their impressive Snooker Academy, as well as managing a wave of players, and having met the likes of Janie and Sarah i have no doubt that there 100% snooker people with their hearts in the right place, and from what ive heard of Paul Mount, he seems to be living a dream at the moment.

However i did stumble across a comment somewhere last week, on another site i think raising concerns that there may be a danger that OnQ could end up with political aspirations within the sport.

With the latest addition of Mark Allen, taking the stable of pros up to around 25 with numerous other amateurs also represented, is there a danger of On Q getting a monopoly of players interests and ultimately a lot of power within the game.

We did see this happen with 110sport in the past, and whilst i wouldnt compare On Q to them cowboys, its still a question that has to be raised IMO.

Id expect to get shot down to flames by some for even raising this subject, and i certainly dont expect, or wish for Sarah, Janie or anyone else to feel the need to defend or argue the case against.

Personally i dont really envisage any problems in the future, but it has crossed my mind that one party having a growing monopoly on players cant surely be healthy in the long run.

I do know that the Grove has a good few players on its books too, and it may just be that they are a smaller, London based version of On Q.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Wildey

no i dont think Paul Mount has any aspiration to be political in any way like Barry Hearn,Howard Krugar and Ian Doyle before him.

Paul is putting something back to the sport he loves by being supportive to players of all ages and standing in the game.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Sarah Mount

Witz78 wrote:Before i start i will say that i totally commend what On Q Promotions have done with building and establishing their impressive Snooker Academy, as well as managing a wave of players, and having met the likes of Janie and Sarah i have no doubt that there 100% snooker people with their hearts in the right place, and from what ive heard of Paul Mount, he seems to be living a dream at the moment.

However i did stumble across a comment somewhere last week, on another site i think raising concerns that there may be a danger that OnQ could end up with political aspirations within the sport.

With the latest addition of Mark Allen, taking the stable of pros up to around 25 with numerous other amateurs also represented, is there a danger of On Q getting a monopoly of players interests and ultimately a lot of power within the game.

We did see this happen with 110sport in the past, and whilst i wouldnt compare On Q to them cowboys, its still a question that has to be raised IMO.

Id expect to get shot down to flames by some for even raising this subject, and i certainly dont expect, or wish for Sarah, Janie or anyone else to feel the need to defend or argue the case against.

Personally i dont really envisage any problems in the future, but it has crossed my mind that one party having a growing monopoly on players cant surely be healthy in the long run.

I do know that the Grove has a good few players on its books too, and it may just be that they are a smaller, London based version of On Q.


Hi Witz,

Firstly, I am more than happy to reply and hopefully ease some of your concerns and any concerns others may have. We have nothing to hide and have always operated transparently and will continue to do so. The only time I will not make a comment is on anything confidential for one of our clients or in a situation that does not involve us. Otherwise, try and shut me up ;-)

I assume the other comment you are referring to is the one on Pro Snooker Blog's post on Jamie Jones, Michael White and Liam Highfield joining On Q. If so, I have read and replied to that comment today as it was the first chance I have had to read the snooker sites since before the Pink Ribbon.

The addition of Mark Allen today has taken us to 23 clients. 6 of those are amateurs currently and the other 17 are professionals. I understand your concerns about On Q possibly having too much power with so many players on the books but when you consider the varying positions of those players you will see that each player has their own needs. They can be broken down into ranking categories to show this better. Currently we manage 1 top 16 player, 4 top 32 players (one of whom started last season in the top 48), 3 top 48 players (one of whom started last season in the top 64), 4 top 64 players (one of whom started last season outside the top 64), 5 players ranked 65-100. What I am trying to explain is that what may be best for Mr X in the top 32 may not be best for Mr Z outside the top 64 so we have to take each player as an individual and provide them with support tailored to their needs at any given time in their career. I think the issue of power is only a problem if your clients are all in a similar position and would therefore all benefit from certain decisions, or lose out from others.

We have a long term vision in place that will see our clients working as part of a cycle within the company. We envisage the amateurs replacing our 65-100 players, who have replaced our top 64 players, who have replaced our top 48 players and so on. This is obviously a long term plan which will work over many years. As our experienced players get older, we will have a new batch of experienced players to follow on from them when they retire. As you can see I am talking about long into the future here.

As I said on the post on Pro Snooker Blog, we are dedicated to working with World Snooker and the WPBSA to ensure that snooker goes from strength to strength. If everyone works together then in theory a greater product will be created and everyone will benefit from that, ourselves and our clients included. Therefore, both World Snooker and the WPBSA have our full support.

As you mention, the Grove are another management company within snooker who also have a number of clients. It would be nice to see more management companies within the game though as it can only help to improve the professionalism within snooker and go towards creating a sport that is even more marketable and sustainable. It is just important that any rivalries and competitiveness is kept on the table between the players.

I hope that helps to answer the questions and concerns you expressed. Please do feel free to ask any further questions as I am more than happy to answer them :-)

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Sarah Mount

Wild wrote:no i dont think Paul Mount has any aspiration to be political in any way like Barry Hearn,Howard Krugar and Ian Doyle before him.

Paul is putting something back to the sport he loves by being supportive to players of all ages and standing in the game.


You're right Wild, he doesn't.

He has invested a lot of time and money into SWSA and On Q all of which was done with the best of intentions for all parties.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Witz78

Sarah,

thanks for the lengthy and detailed reply to my post.

Thats reassuring to hear it from the horses mouth, though to be honest personally i had little fears of there being any ulterior motive or future political interests on the part of On Q.

I mainly raised the issue as i had seen that comment on Pro Snooker Blog (ahh thats where it was, thought it was one of the blogs !?! ) and it seemed a relevant point to raise, given your undoubted rise in a short space of time, plus with the recent 110sport debacle still fresh in everyones memory.

And its good to hear and see that your working in unison with World Snooker continues to grow from strength to strength.

All the best and i will try and pop down to the SWSA with my cue sometime.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Roland

I chatted to Paul about his vision and he wants to build from the grass roots. He needs the established name or two of which Mark Allen is one and Jimmy White another but he wants to bring some youngsters through. He has built the facilities all snooker players would love to be based at and he has set a precident so it's up to someone else to do the same elsewhere in the UK and build their own team.

On Twitter I've likened it to Arsene Wenger. Spend some money on bringing a few established names for PR and tv appearances, and focus mainly on bringing up your own kids and hopefully one day you'll have a World Champion.

And the going hasn't been straight forward for him. You wouldn't believe some of the things he's had to go through and the extra money he's had to spend to get where he is today with the Academy and holding ranking qualifiers and PTC events.

As if it needed saying, I am 100% behind SWSA. Paul Mount has done what I would do if I won the lottery. I'm not in a position to start my own academy but he is living my dream and boy is it working.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Wildey

Sonny wrote:Not in the least bit worried, but invariably when you are in his position political issues arrive on your doorstep without you constructively looking for them.

thinking of other powerful managements and looking at onQ in my opinion they approach things from a different angle. as you said the goal for onQ is to find a player the Goal for Barry was to make money from Davis and Ian Doyle the same with Hendry and both those 2 men built their stable around those 2 players. ....paul isn't doing that its all about nurturing young players to be the best for him.

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Sarah Mount

Witz78 wrote:Sarah,

thanks for the lengthy and detailed reply to my post.

Thats reassuring to hear it from the horses mouth, though to be honest personally i had little fears of there being any ulterior motive or future political interests on the part of On Q.

I mainly raised the issue as i had seen that comment on Pro Snooker Blog (ahh thats where it was, thought it was one of the blogs !?! ) and it seemed a relevant point to raise, given your undoubted rise in a short space of time, plus with the recent 110sport debacle still fresh in everyones memory.

And its good to hear and see that your working in unison with World Snooker continues to grow from strength to strength.

All the best and i will try and pop down to the SWSA with my cue sometime.


You're very welcome Witz. It was a totally reasonable question to put out there. To be honest we are a little surprised at how quickly On Q has grown but this was what we were working towards. The fact that we got there earlier than planned is great.

It'd be great to see you at SWSA sometime in the future :-)

Re: Is there a danger that OnQ Promotions becoming too power

Postby Sarah Mount

Sonny wrote:I chatted to Paul about his vision and he wants to build from the grass roots. He needs the established name or two of which Mark Allen is one and Jimmy White another but he wants to bring some youngsters through. He has built the facilities all snooker players would love to be based at and he has set a precident so it's up to someone else to do the same elsewhere in the UK and build their own team.

On Twitter I've likened it to Arsene Wenger. Spend some money on bringing a few established names for PR and tv appearances, and focus mainly on bringing up your own kids and hopefully one day you'll have a World Champion.

And the going hasn't been straight forward for him. You wouldn't believe some of the things he's had to go through and the extra money he's had to spend to get where he is today with the Academy and holding ranking qualifiers and PTC events.

As if it needed saying, I am 100% behind SWSA. Paul Mount has done what I would do if I won the lottery. I'm not in a position to start my own academy but he is living my dream and boy is it working.


You're spot on Sonny! We have players who we would be looking to progress in the televised rounds and win events and others who are working up to that point. It is very much a cycle. Continuing the football analogy, it is the difference between Arsenal and Chelsea.

You're not wrong when you say it hasn't been straight forward for him to get things where they are. It amazing how much bureaucracy gets in the way!

Thanks for your support Sonny! As well as to everyone on Snooker Island. It really means a lot. Paul is very lucky to be living his dream and we want to share it with as many people as possible!