Tatiana Woollaston still has to pinch herself when she strides out to referee at major snooker tournaments.
The Leicester-based, Belarus-born official is currently on duty at the UK Championship in York. Woollaston, 37, has emerged as one of the top referees on the World Snooker Tour and had the honour of overseeing one of the semi-finals at this year’s World Championship.
It’s a position she will never take for granted. “I still don’t believe it,” she admits in an interview for Reach’s special UK Championship publication. “From watching on the sofa with my dad to walking out at the Crucible with one table, which luckily for me happened this year, it’s still gives me goosebumps.
“I can’t believe it’s happened and I feel very privileged and grateful to World Snooker and my colleagues who have supported me over the years. It’s a dream and I love it.”
Woollaston, who is married to player Ben Woollaston, caught the snooker bug as a teenager, avidly watching matches with her dad on Russian-language Eurosport in Belarus. “It was back when there were just five or six events a year,” she recalls. “Every time an event finished, it was like, ‘Oh my god, it’s three or four months until the next one!’ Me and my dad never missed a match.
“Because it was a new sport in Eastern Europe, the Russian Eurosport commentator would regularly explain the rules. I was fascinated by it. It was like chess, I loved it. One of my favourite players from back in the day was Peter Ebdon because I enjoyed the safety play rather than just breaks and potting. Even now, I ask Ben how he knows where cue ball is going to go. It still fascinates me to this day because the skill is so unbelievable.”
With snooker being a minority pursuit in Eastern Europe, she never considered a career in the sport until her final year at university when she surprisingly spotted an advert for a tournament.
“One day, I was on the underground and there was an advertisement board saying, ‘Belarus Snooker Championship’,” she says. “I thought, ‘Surely there’s no snooker in Belarus’ because I thought it was only based in the UK, where it’s mainly played.
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“But I went to the local club, which was mainly a Russian billiards club. There were only three snooker tables in there. I saw some people refereeing and they had their name badges. I found one of the guys on social media and asked if I could try and referee. They invited me to one of their refereeing meetings and that’s where it all started.
“I went to the 2009 European Amateur Championship for under-21s and under-19s in St Petersburg. It was a new sport in Russia as well and they didn’t have enough local referees so they asked us to come and help. I met Luca Brecel and other players who went on to become pros at that tournament.”
Refereeing rather than playing was always Woollaston’s passion. She admits: “I don’t play at all. I’ve probably held a cue 10 times in all those years. I’ve never actually wanted to play. It’s the refereeing part that I enjoy.”
It is also a job she excels in, with Ronnie O’Sullivan calling her the “best ref in the world by a mile” during the last World Championship. Women’s snooker star Reanne Evans agreed, saying at the time: “She’s a top ref. I really rate her, she’s a great girl as well. She deserves the final. She’s top class and I hope she does get the final next year.”
So what makes a good snooker referee? “It requires a lot of concentration because, at any given time, something can happen and you need to know where the balls were,” explains Woollaston.
“The safety part is the one that requires the most concentration. Especially for a referee who, like me, doesn’t play. You have to learn the way it’s played. You need to anticipate what’s going to happen. You have to be able to read the game and not to be noticed.
“When people say, ‘I don’t remember who refereed that match’, that’s a good thing. You need to do things quickly and efficiently. You have to adjust to the players that you referee, where they prefer you to stand, whether they play at a slower pace.
“A player might prefer me to stand a certain side depending on if he’s a left-hander or a right-hander. You learn with experience. Concentration is the big part, there’s not a second you can relax. You have to be on the ball all the time.”
Woollaston, obviously, cannot referee any of Ben’s matches. While the couple are avid snooker watchers, they keep their respective careers as separate as possible.
“I don’t spend time with Ben while he’s practising to help me refereeing-wise,” she adds. “He’s on the circuit as a player, I’m on the circuit as a referee. We’ve never really mix that. I’m obviously not allowed to referee his games and I wouldn’t want to, to be fair.”
Back during the days of Michaela Tabb, the sight of a female referee in a male-dominated sport was a newsworthy point of interest. Refreshingly, that isn’t the case now thanks to a burgeoning number of female officials.
“There are quite a few from different areas of the world, including China and Eastern Europe,” Woollaston points out. “It maybe was a thing back in the day, ‘Oh, there’s a female referee’. Now we are just referees, we’ve all established ourselves.
“We’re not being seen as female referees and male referees, we’re just being seen as officials. It’s not news anymore. It’s great for growing the game. As long as you’re good at your job, it doesn’t matter.”
In what will be a surprise to some, refereeing is Woollaston’s “hobby” rather than full-time job. Despite being a regular at major tournaments, she squeezes in a day job as a merchandiser for Next, whose head office is in Leicester.
“That’s a surprise for people, that I’ve got a full-time job,” she says. “Refereeing is my hobby. It’s [Next] a great company to work for and they’re very supportive of my refereeing career.
“They’ve been flexible with giving me time off when I need to go away or I sometimes work from hotels rooms rather than come into the office. They’re really proud to see me on TV.”
Meanwhile, the Woollastons, who have two sons together, support each other in their respective snooker careers. She adds: “Ben’s career is immensely important but he would never say no to me going to any snooker events because he knows how much I love it.
“If he’s out of the event, he’ll take over doing school pick-ups and homework. We work around each other while Ben’s mum plays a big role helping us with the kids.”
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