The World Snooker Tour has released a statement regarding an ongoing issue with its live scoring platform this season.
There has been widespread criticism of WST during the 2023/24 season so far regarding the matter.
During Championship League Snooker – the first ranking event of the new term – and again at last week’s European Masters qualifiers, there were major problems.
Having been promised a new and improved live snooker scoring system ahead of the fresh season, fans were understandably disappointed at what transpired.
Ahead of the Championship League, WST announced on its website a new scoring section, but when directed to the page there was nothing available.
When live scores were eventually added, the platform offered only basic information like the match and frame scores.
Other key information which was previously available, such as breaks, average shot time, and even the remaining points on the table during a frame, were missing.
However, WST has now revealed that it ran into difficulties with its previous provider and that a new service will still be launched later this year.
“As previously announced during the Cazoo World Championship, WST will be launching a new and vastly improved website and app in November this year,” the statement read.
“The initial plan was to continue with the previous scoring platform during the interim period.”
“However, due to unforeseen late changes with existing providers, a temporary scoring site was needed to be created in a very short space of time.
“Whilst we are pleased that we have been able to fulfill that need to a degree, we also share the disappointment of fans regarding the platform’s reliability at the early stages of its roll out.
This was due in part to providers being new to this very complex project, which they had short notice to pull together.
“There has also been a large amount of data scraping from illicit sources, which has caused excessive traffic on the live scoring infrastructure.
“Steps have been taken to mitigate this issue going forward and that resulted in improved stability towards the end of BetVictor European Masters qualifying.
“The issues we have experienced have subsequently led to a delay in deployment of the key features that fans have been accustomed to.
“These include: points remaining, player photos, current break data and the draw.
“Now that we have stabilised the platform, we are hopeful that all of these features will be deployed in time for the Cazoo British Open Qualifiers on August 14th.
“We understand frustrations from fans that the platform hasn’t been up to the standard that they expect and deserve.
“But rest assured we have been working extensively with our providers to ensure we are back on track as soon as possible.
“We appreciate your patience.”
Featured photo credit: WST
