The Underground Referee

By Elliott West

Introduction

Snooker is my passion and as you must be aware, it takes quite a lot of research to create each written piece. So prior to me publishing this blog, I was pleasantly surprised when I stumbled across the subject of this article in my research. To my joy, I found that John Smyth who some you will remember was a prominent snooker referee in the 1970s and 1980s, originally worked as a tube driver on the Piccadilly line and worked for London Underground for 28 years and was a Piccadilly line snooker champion six times.This fact made me smile because like John, I am currently a Customer Service Supervisor for London Underground at Victoria station and have worked for the company for 19 years. I also found out recently whilst doing my family tree that my Great Uncle, Cyril Bull was a Station Foreman at White City tube station from the 1940s onwards. It certainly is a small world!

Snooker Career

Born on the 28 May 1928 in Dublin, John Smyth moved to England when he was 21 and started a career as a Piccadilly line driver. With a keen interest for snooker, John homed in on his skills and combined them with his passion for the sport, turning his attention to becoming a snooker referee. He started referring in 1967 and oversaw his first match at professional level when he presided over the 1973 Norwich Union Open between Sid Hood and Jackie Rea. A match that Hood won 4-0.

Smyth became a full-time referee in 1978 and refereed two World Championship finals, firstly in 1977 when John Spencer beat Cliff Thorburn, 25-21 and Alex Higgins’ famous second World Championship title in 1982 when he defeated Ray Reardon, 18-15. John also oversaw the maximum break made by Kirk Stevens against Jimmy White in the ninth frame of their semi-final bout at the 1984 Masters at the Wembley Conference Centre. A break which earned Stevens, £10,000 and was only the third televised 147, the second of Kirk’s career, made so special by the other being made in practice.

Smyth became a household name in the 1980s when snooker was at its height, thanks largely to excellent marketing and the limited number of television channels at the time. John rubbed shoulders with all the snooker greats of the time from the Spencer/Reardon rivalry years, the Steve Davis era through to the start of Stephen Hendry’s dominance. Smyth recognised this surge in popularity for snooker and so decided to retire from London Underground and concentrate his attention in a career as a professional referee. John reflected on this decision later, saying:

“I spent 28 years on the Underground, but gave it all up when snooker began to get big on television. John Street, John Williams and myself, got more and more work as the circuit grew. In the end, my employers saw more of me on TV than they did at work. People told me it was daft to give up the Tube, and that I’d never earn a living from snooker. They said it would never last on TV, but they were wrong”.

John Smyth

The Irishman was also a pivotal figure in the setting up and implementation of the Professional Referees’ Association in 1977 and became the PRA president in 1997. Smyth retired from being a referee on the professional circuit in 1996 after a long and illustrious presence in the sport. A stickler for perfection, Smyth once commented on one of his errors, a wrong call in a Ray Reardon-Alex Higgins match, 10 years on from when it happened, in 1974:

“Players get to know you, you’ve been together for so long, at so many tournaments, they realise you’re only human and they forget your mistakes easier than anyone else. But if you’ve had a bad match, you find it hard to get to sleep at night”.

John Smyth

Summary

John Smyth was a key figure in the history of snooker refereeing. A man who was widely respected in the sport and who oversaw some of the iconic matches of the period. A man who spilt his career between driving passengers the length and breadth of the Piccadilly line to becoming the overseer of the snooker rule book in a match environment. A snooker legend who remains preserved in our minds and film, John sadly passed away in 2007, aged 78 after a battle of his own with cancer.