22 April 2024 , 15:00
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Shaun Murphy has told Hossein Vafaei not to come back to the World Snooker Championship in future if he thinks the Crucible "smells really bad".
The sport's most prestigious tournament is back at its Sheffield home, albeit there is talk of the competition heading elsewhere as the venue becomes increasingly dated. Ronnie O'Sullivan took aim at the facility and now Vafaei, who lost in the first round to Judd Trump, has joined.
Vafaei claimed that the Crucible had major issues and is an advocate of the tournament heading to pastures new. Saudi Arabia and China have been touted as locations with the Iranian admitting he doesn't want to come back.
He said: "You want to go somewhere really nice as a player, as a media team.. you walk around the Crucible and it smells really bad. As a player I’m honest, it’s just really bad. Everything’s so bad. You go to other venues in other countries and you see how nice they treat you. Everything is shiny. But here it’s completely different."
"If you ask me do I want to come back here again, I tell you no way. The practice room, do you see anything special? I feel like I’m practising in a garage."
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Murphy was the world champion back in 2005 and is, again, back at the Crucible. He admitted that not everyone feels passionately about the Sheffield venue, but reminded Vafaei he was under no obligation to attend.
He said: "Listen, this is a working theatre, it’s not a purpose-built snooker venue. We’re coming up on the 50th anniversary of snooker being here. If World Snooker Tour turned up tomorrow to do a site visit, they probably wouldn’t come here because it’s not big enough. There’s nothing we can do about that.
Hossein Vafaei took aim at the state of the Sheffield-based venue"But this is holy ground and it’s almost sacrilege for a professional snooker player to be so openly critical about our home. Hossein should educate himself on how our tour work and the relationships with WST and our broadcast partners, our venues and how special these places are.
"Does he think he’s helping the sport grow by being so openly critical of one of our business partners? He hasn’t helped the sport at all and I was always taught by my mum, if you haven’t got anything nice to say, don’t say anything.
"Maybe he didn’t come here as a nine-year-old child as I did and remember running up that road after Steve Davis for his autograph. Maybe he doesn’t have those memories to draw on, but this is holy ground for snooker players and Hossein should remember that."