Snooker player and commentator John Virgo has died at the age of 79, World Snooker Tour (WST) has announced.<\/p>\n
Virgo, who won the UK Championship in 1979, enjoyed a long and storied career but was perhaps best known for his work as a broadcaster.<\/p>\n
He was an established part of the BBC\u2019s snooker coverage as a commentator, famous for his catchphrase of \u2018Where\u2019s the cue ball going?\u2019<\/p>\n
Virgo was also well known for his role on the 1990s snooker show Big Break and was a regular on the exhibition circuit with his vast array of trick shots.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone at World Snooker Tour is deeply saddened to learn of the passing of legendary snooker player and broadcaster John Virgo, aged 79,\u201d a WST statement read.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur thoughts are with his family and loved ones. Rest in peace, JV.\u201d<\/p>\n
Virgo spent 18 years as a professional and reached the World Championship semi-finals in 1979, the year he won the UK Championship.<\/p>\n
He retired in 1994 and was later inducted into the World Snooker Tour hall of fame for his success on the baize and his work as a broadcaster.<\/p>\n
The news of his death led to tributes from those he left an indelible mark on.<\/p>\n
Four-time world champion Mark Selby posted on X: \u201cSo so sad to hear the news of the passing of John Virgo!!! Such a great guy and a huge character!! He will be greatly missed! RIP JV\u201d<\/p>\n
Neil Robertson, who won the 2010 World Championship, said: \u201cSo sad to hear about the news of John Virgo\u2019s passing. He was a great character and an amazing pundit\/commentator.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had the pleasure of sharing the booth with him during the World Championships a couple of years ago in which I got a huge appreciation for how good he was.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Snooker player and commentator John Virgo has died at the age of 79, World Snooker Tour (WST) has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":319731,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[76],"tags":[18,19,17,154640,132],"class_list":["post-319730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-eire","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-snooker","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116012325634822831","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/319731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}