BILLIARDS RULES

Evening Star, Issue 19791, 15 February 1928, Page 2

BILLIARDS RULES

REVISION DESIRED There is a growing feeling among English amateur billiard players that the rules of the game are unsatisfactory (writes H.S., in the Melbourne ‘Argus’). They may suit professionals, but may not necessarily be good for amateurs. If there were a consensus of opinion upon what modifications should be made, the task of the Billiards Council, which is now requested to do all sorts of contradictory things, would be relatively easy; but except in the sense of “ whatever is, is wrong,” there is no unanimity among the complainants. One iconoclast would have the scores of all strokes levelled down to one. You pot the white, say; you get one. By a miracle of luck or dexterity you make a cannon, pocket the red, pocket the white, and go in off the red; still you get but one. Misses' and coups this reformer would have declared fouls, with the balls spotted for the opponent. Yet he makes some concessions to human frailty, and so in the event of a player having a doublebaulk left he would not have him penalised if he failed to strike either of the object balls. As for potting the white, he would take the sting out of these tactics by having the rule so altered that the potted white, instead of being “dead” as it is now, would be very ranch alive, for it would be taken out of the pocket, placed on the centre of the 11 D” line, and in that position it would be declared imtnune from the attack of the potter, supposing that he were in hand. Then to encourage all-round play ho would allow a sequence of five shots of a kind only. THE PRIVILEGED RED. Another amateur asks the council to inform him why a player should make three for scorhag off the red and only

I two for scoring off the white. I asked John Roberts that question many years ago, and he replied; “Because the red is a privileged ball. If you [iot the red it comes up again; if yon put the white down, it stays down.” “But that refers to winners,” I said. “ Why should you get three for going in off the red and only two when you go in off the white?” “When you go in off the red,” said Roberts, with an air of finality, “ you go in off the privileged ball, and, of course, you got more for doing so than if you wont in off the white.” With due respect to Roberts, however, for his explanation, it explained nothing. Perhaps the reason for the differentiation between white and red scoring will never be known, but I may hazard a conjecture which does not offend the probabilities. English billiards was intended to be a three-ball game, just as the cannon game is a three-ball game. But in the early days, when the pockets were very large and potting therefore very easy, there was always a danger of an unenterprising player frequently . converting it into a two-ball game by putting the white down. Thus the ancient legislators wisely made whiteball play unattractive compared with red-hall play. If the white was pocketed it was off the table until the striker broke down, and when this happened his opponent had the advantage of not being compelled to play from a fixed position. It may be noted, however, that in the event of a double baulk the advantage of not having to play from a fixed position would disappear. ABOLISHING TWO-BALL PLAY. Another amateur who is in favor of revising the rules probably had this in mind when he suggested to the council that if the white was potted it should be placed on the centre spot of the table and the non-striker should then play on; further, that baulk should be no protection. In other words, he would abolish the protective quality of

the baulk lino altogether, and, incidentally, he would, in doing so, make two-ball billiards impossible. This critic does not see why the spot stroke should be limited to one, and many will agree witli him. Indeed, why limit the spot stroke play at all? Certainly it should not be limited for amateurs, and it is the point of view of the amateur that 1 am considering. Another and rather cynical critic thinks that if the Billiards Control Club is so keen upon “tinkering” with the rules it should let cannons and hazards, all count three. “That,” he maliciously says, “would enable our amateur games to be finished more quickly, which would give pleasure to all,” LIMITING HAZARDS. What one might have expected amateur players to state as their chief grievance is the limitation of hazards to a score of 75, winners to count in the sequence as well as losers. They say nothing about that at all. Yet it is the losing hazard that amateurs in the first rank have come to rely on mainly for their scoring during the last twenty-five years. Silence on this point, therefore, is surprising. The limitation of hazards should improve the quality of amateur scoring, though it would certainly reduce its quantity, but limitations should have been brought about indirectly, so to speaa. Granted that both for the amateur and professional the hazard has become too easy. Close up the “D” an inch or more, hazard sequences will he thus curtailed and there will be no necessity to hobble the game by arbitrarily limiting them. Another restriction which should he removed is that which says that only a single spot stroke shall be made. If this shot, or any other shot, is fair, it seems to be illogical to limit it at all; but if the spot stroke had become too easy, as it undoubtedly had before it was barred, then, instead of barring it and thereby depriving the game of a picturesque feature, the. billiard spot should have

been moved hall an inch or so nearer the top cushion. That simple expedient would have made overgrown spotstroke breaks impossible. The nursery cannon, which lias been played ad nauseam of late years, undoubtedly needs dealing with severely. The best way of doing this would bo to draw a baulk line all round the table and limit the number of consecutive cannons that could be played in baulk. That would be no experiment, but an approved expedient which has been adopted with the happiest results both in the United States and in Europe.