John Virgo, 79, passed away a week today, on January 5th 2026, in Spain after suffering from a ruptured aorta in the early hours of the morning.

The snooker player and commentator was born and raised locally in Salford, where his father, William, was a dockyard crane driver and his mother, Florence, worked as a shop assistant.

An avid Manchester United fan, Virgo was loved by the local community. A local who worked for Virgo’s youth snooker club recounted, “he couldn’t do enough for anybody.”

Initially entering the scene in by winning the u16s Championship, 1962, and furthering his youth career with a u19s Championship win in 1965, he went on to become a national celebrity in his own right.

In the early 1970s, Virgo was still living locally in the North, and frequented Salford’s old snooker hub — Potters Snooker Club.

Paul Davies, 77, who worked part-time at Potters during this era, said: “John was one of the residents there, together with Paul Medati and Alex Higgins.

“The three goons, really. They were playing, doing trick shots and everything. I really enjoyed it.”

Virgo would go on to win the 1979 UK Championship, reaching the semi finals of the World Championship in the same year — losing out to Dennis Taylor 12–19.

He found household fame through BBC’s Big Break, a snooker-based show co-hosted with Jim Davidson between 1991 and 2002, attracting millions of views in the process.

His last appearance as commentator came in January of this year, at the Masters final between John Higgins and Kyren Wilson.

A certain memory of John Virgo sticks out for Davies however, as the club ran out of beer one afternoon.

He said: “All the draymen went on strike. So they said to John ‘would you like to go? Can you go and get us some, a couple of kegs of beer?’ And I said ‘ well, I’ll go as well if you want to get some more.’

“So John said ‘well, I’ve got to get some petrol on the way up.’ And I said ‘all right, I’ll stop behind you.’

“John filled up, jumped back in the car, and drove up. When he opened the boot up, there was such a smell of petrol in the back of his car. When he filled the car up, it didn’t go in the tank. It went in the boot of his car!”

Davies reflected on their luck as John was a smoker, he said “John, we could have all gone up! [in flames] he couldn’t do anything for laughing.

“We got most of it out and gave it a good sweep, and made it back, but we just couldn’t stop laughing,” said Davies.

“That was the story of the of the 12 months.”

Later down the line after being out of contact with Virgo, Paul Davies re-met him at a Howard Keel testimonial golf tournament at Mere Golf and Country Club in Cheshire.

While John was coming around, Paul said ‘Do you remember when we went for the beer?’

Amazingly, Virgo replied “It was you? I was worried, I thought I had dreamt it!” before Davies reassured him it was real.

Speaking on what it meant to have such a success story from a local Salford lad, notably his television career on Big Break, Davies sang Virgo’s praises.

His thoughts on his early experiences with Virgo resonate with all of the messages we saw from friends and colleagues last week.

“He was such a such a nice fella, he couldn’t do enough for anybody. You know, it was like losing a friend again, even though I wasn’t in close contact with him the last 10–15, years.

“But for whenever he was on the telly, I used to make sure I watched it.”

In an era where world-renowned sportsmen also appeared in the area, and specifically Potters Snooker Club, it was still John Virgo who made this lasting impression on people.

Northern Irish superstar, George Best, and 1966 World Cup winner Nobby Styles would often visit the club as there was a hairdressers next door.

These games often featured wagers, and the crowd in Potters were avid fans of horse racing

Davies said: “Very often I’d go to the bookies around the corner and put some money on for John or whoever was there at the time.”