Mark Selby suggests change as he agrees that snooker needs to quicken up

Selby is currently competing at the 2026 World Snooker Championship where he is going for a fifth Crucible crown.

'The Jester from Leicester' was comfortable in the opening round as he sailed past the runner-up from two years ago, Jak Jones, 10-2.

Next up for Selby is an intriguing tie with attacking Chinese youngster Wu Yize in what will likely be a clash of playing styles.

Selby has been unfairly called out before for his sometimes 'dogged' approach to the sport, but he is playing to win, and this is not the norm for him.

One of the greatest players of all-time - as discussed by Steve Davis earlier this week on the BBC - Selby is approaching 1,000 century breaks in professional competition, which would make him only the fifth member of that exclusive club.

He also has six top flight maximum 147 breaks to his name, and is the only player to compile perfection in a world championship final.

A keen fan of other sports, 44-year-old Selby feels that snooker should look at ways it could quicken up.

This was an issue that sports promotions supremo Barry Hearn brought up several years ago with the introduction of 'Average Shot Times' being published on the World Snooker Tour website.

If a player was consistently taking too long to play their shots, they would be informed, with a potential punishment later down the line if they didn't change their ways. However, it doesn't appear that anyone has been disciplined - publicly, anyway - for 'consistent slow play'.

"Every sport seems to be going that kind of way at the moment"

Former world 8-ball pool champion and a winner of the Pairs Cup on the Ultimate Pool circuit, Selby currently averages 24.8 seconds per shot on this season's AST list; not slow at all, placed 66th out of 126 players.

Speaking with World Snooker Championship sponsor Midnite, Selby agrees that snooker should quicken up slightly, but how to do that without ruining the charm of the sport is a difficult one.

"We've tried to improve it, like they did average shot time, so maybe you could quicken the game up a little bit" said the reigning UK Champion.

"Every sport seems to be going that kind of way at the moment. You look at golf with what they've done with the LIV tour, they were doing three rounds instead of four. I know they've gone back to four now but every sport that's sort of got like a quick flow to it seems to attract the audience a lot more than something that drags out.

"So maybe try and quicken the game up some way, however way possible they'll do that, I'm not sure, but maybe something like that."

One of the reasons why snooker is so popular amongst its legion of fans is because of the different styles of play and methodology.

Not every player can win a frame in one visit all the time, whether that be because of the layout of the balls or current form, and Selby feels that more respect should be given to those types of grafters who are trying their best to win.

"Obviously not everyone's blessed with just a natural talent. Some people have to work harder at the game than others. So I think people should respect that.

"If you're still playing at the top of the game, irrelevant of how your game is, whether it's like you're a natural flair player or whether you have to work hard at it, just to get to the top of the game is tough. So however you do it, people should respect that" said the world number seven.

"For sure, the other side of the game is under-estimated. I mean, obviously it'd be great, it'd be lovely, if everyone could go out there and play No Miss Snooker every single time, but at the same time it'd be quite boring.

"It's nice that sometimes you see all these top players, especially like when the amateurs are watching, they see these top players missing easy balls or missing a straight black off the spot! They sort of look at it and think 'well, you know what, they are human, we can do that'.

"I was watching the golf only last week and I've seen one of the guys top the ball into the water and I think I do that all the while but you're not used to seeing them do it but it's nice you know that's just sport the end of day and everyone's human."

Selby starts his three-session, best of 25 frames encounter with Wu on Sunday morning (10:00BST).

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