BILLIARDS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 815, 8 November 1929, Page 7

BILLIARDS

A HUNDRED IN FOUR MINUTES By RISO LEVI Author of “ Billiards: The Strokes of she Game” and **,Billiards For The Million.'* I Copyright j Iu pre-war days I had au argiim. it with A. E. Williams, a well-known professional who left England for Australia many years ago, as to tin average rate of scoring in professional play. Williams stated that even without the assistance of any nursery cannons he could always score 100 b> top-of-the-table play inside four minutes. There were several players present at this discussion, but I was the only one to maintain that Williams would always fail to accomplish this feat. In order to settle the argument. Williams agreed to my suggestion thai he should play a break on the table on which he regularly practised, which break could be timed by a stop-watch which one of us carried.

Naturally, Williams played his fastest —incidentally he missed a couple of shots by reason of his striking his ball too quickly, which, however, for the purpose of the test, we considered as made —but the 10a took just 4J minutes. Williams was not satisfied with this result, so ho decided to have another try. Again a couple of missed strokes were considered as made, hut the 100 was not reached until he had been playing 4min. 40sec.

A fortnight later Williams was playing an exhibition game and one after noon I watched him make a beautiful break of 480, most of which was mad* at the top of the table. I timed the break carefully, and found that each 100 took from 6 to 6£ minutes. On this occasion he could not afford to take risks by playing strokes too quickly, and though the break con tained more than one nice little run of nursery cannons, he had to plav from the D now and then, and occasionally had to put on his thinking cap to decide how to play some particular stroke. Naturally, it is one thing to try to score 100 in record time when not playing a game, and when missed strokes are considered as mad' . and another thing when failure at a stroke terminates a break and lot one's opponent in. WHEN I TIMED SMITH

Quite recently Willie Smith was play ing in Manchester, and in the course of conversation with him I related this incident of many years ago. Smith’s reply was that he frequently made a big break which was largely composed of top-of-the-table play, but which contained no runs of nurserycannons—the Darlington man never goes in for close-cannon play—and that a few weeks previously he had made a break of 550 odd in 10 minutes. He had, of course, not timed it himself, he told me, but that the time taken to compile the break had been officially given in the Press. When I told Smith that without nursery-cannon play it was absolutely impossible for him to make a 50<> break at an average rate of four minutes per 100, let alone at something less than 3£ minutes for each 100, he did not seek to dispute my statement, aud finally* I said that I would time his next few big breaks and give him particulars afterward. The very next day he made two big breaks, each of which exceeded 400. He played these breaks at his usual speed, and yet the fastest 100 took over five minutes —minutes was the longest time for any 100. Mosl of the 100’s were made in about 5i minutes, and this was the average time per 100 for both breaks. In the evening, when Smith went to the table for the last time, he wanted only 250 for game, and was so much ahead of his opponent that he could not possibly lose. He knew that I was timing him again, and he played his fastest. In the first 100, however, he had to play a g"ood few strokes from the D. and so he was unable to beat 51 .minutes. He had to pass me after making the stroke which took Ihr break to 100, and as he did so, he looked at me, and I said, “Five anil a-half minutes, Willie.” And then i knew that he was going to make a supreme effort to score the next 10*> dn four minutes. I am more than glad •to be able to testify that he just suc ; ceeded in doing this. Except for one stroke from the D, the 100 points were compiled at the top of the table by alternate pots and cannons—often two pots to one cannon. SMITH AGAINST THE CLOCK

Smith has never played faster—perhaps never quite so fast, as he did for that particular hundred. He saw me, watch in hand, timing him, and he almost ran from one side of the table to the other. John Roberts was a remarkably rapid scorer, but he certainly never played faster than Smith did during that break. Indeed. I question whether he ever played at anything like the speed during that particular hundred, when the strokes by which it was compiled are taken into consideration. Time after time Smith slammed the red down—and into none-too-easy pockets—by strong run-throughs, screw-backs, or stun strokes, and yet his bridge hand was scarcely on the table for these difficult shots before he struck his hall The break, and the speed at which it was made, was a revelation to all billiards players who have more than a passing acquaintance with the game, and I left the hall with the feeling that very many years must elapse before we have a player who is greater than Willie Smith is today.

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