Hazel Irvine Leads BBC Coverage as Snooker Presenters Return
Hazel Irvine is fronting the 's World Snooker Championships coverage, keeping snooker presenters front and center on one of the sport's biggest broadcasts. The 60-year-old remains one of the familiar faces of the channel's snooker team. Her private life, though, has stayed tightly guarded even as her on-air role continues.
Hazel Irvine and Snooker
Irvine has become best known for anchoring the World Snooker Championship and the sport's other Triple Crown events. She has worked in television for nearly 40 years, a run that has carried her across snooker, golf, the Olympic Games and other major events.
That long stretch in front of the camera is part of what makes her current Championship role notable. She is still the presenter viewers associate with the tournament, even after years of scaling her commitments around family life.
Private Marriage in Scotland
Her marriage has remained just as private as much of her family story. In 2008, she married her long-term partner in an intimate ceremony in Scotland, and the name of her husband has never been disclosed. The couple welcomed a daughter the following year, when Irvine was 43, and the child's name has also stayed out of public view.
At a charity sports quiz in London, she joked about family changes with the line, “My clothes are already feeling the squeeze. My husband and I have a new arrival coming in the spring, which is going to be a drain on my own profits.”
2017 Changes at Sport
In 2017, Irvine stepped away from golf coverage to focus on family life. She said then, “I was pleased to be offered another long-term contract with Sport to continue presenting snooker, golf and major events.”
She added, “However, after much thought, I have decided that in what is my 30th year in broadcast sport, I want to realign my on–air commitments around the changing needs of my family.”
That decision did not end her presence on major sport. It narrowed the load while keeping snooker at the center of her work, which is why her role in the World Snooker Championships still carries the most weight.
From Childhood to Championship
In 2019, she looked back on the roots of that connection. “As a child, I spent my pocket money on stickers for an Olympics sticker book,” she said. “I had a very happy childhood doing sport and outdoor stuff. My dad made this half-size snooker table for my brother and me, and mum crocheted the pockets.”
That detail ties the current broadcast back to the person behind it: a veteran presenter who has kept her home life out of view while returning again and again to the sport that helped shape her. For viewers following the Championship coverage now, Irvine is still the steady name at the desk.
