David Awopetu
Former snooker star and BBC commentator Willie Thorne has died at the age of 66, says World Snooker.
Thorne was diagnosed with leukaemia in March and was taken to hospital in Spain last week with dangerously low blood pressure.
He retired from professional snooker in 2001 and for many years was a respected BBC commentator.
Thorne reached two World Championship quarter-finals during his career and won the 1985 Mercantile Credit Classic.
He twice reached a world ranking of seven and spent 20 years among the top 32, before moving into a commentary career spanning more than 30 years with BBC, ITV and Sky.
With snooker’s popularity soaring during the mid 1980s, Thorne featured in a group of leading players who joined Chas and Dave to perform their song Snooker Loopy, which reached number six in the UK charts in 1986.
