Billiards

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 879, 24 January 1930, Page 7

Billiards

By

RISO LEVI

(Coptright J

SQUARE SCREW STROKES AND HOW TO PLAY THEM

The average player almost invariably uses a fast stroke for a screw, and the bigger the screw the higher tlie pace at which he plays it. When the object ball is a loqg way from the cue ball a good deal of pace is, of course, essential for a screw. This in in order that the reverse rotation

which is imparted to the cue* ball by reason of its having been hit below the centre may be in evidence at the moment of contact with the object ball. A ball under the influence of reverse rotation drags and slides along the cloth, and the friction thus engendered checks, and soon stops, this retrograde rotation if the ball is travelling without much pace. When however, the object ball is at no great distance from the cue ball, and the stroke is a square or squarish screw there is no need to play a smashing stroke. In the first place, when you use high pace, evert though you may get the stroke played for, you have little or no control of the object ball when the stroke is an in-olf, or of either object ball if it is a cannon, and thus the after-position is left to chance; if it turns out well, you have fluked a good leave. Secondly, high pace often makes a squarish screw a much more uncertain shot than it is when played at slow or medium pace. If you are an ordinary player, try the screw in-off illustrated on diagram 29 from the position of the cue ball at A. Do not hit the ball too low —half-way between its centre and the bed of the table is low enough—and use no side. Hold your cue lightly as you draw it back, and send it forward, but grip it tightly at the very moment that it meets the ball, and do not draw it back, or even arrest it, immediately it hits it, but let it go well through the ball. If you will carry out these instructions you will find that even though your record break may only be a mere 25 or 30, you will, after a very few attempts at it, be able to get this screw in-off by quite a medium-pace stroke. Indeed, you will very likely get it at the first attempt. When you can get this in-off quite easily with the cue ball at A, try it from B. The stroke is exactly the same as before with the exception that the object ball should be taken a shade fuller, and more pace should be used. Next Article: A PROBLEM STROKE.