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The Snooker Thread. V. "Sport" for pacemaker patients and the deaf

I dunno man, it's been years since I cleaned up on a pool table, and those sort of shenanigans only used to happen when I was playing every day, we'd been playing snooker for a few hours beforehand so the pool table felt like a little kids toy, and we were playing on the snooker clubs competition pool table not some threadbare wonky table down the local. Even then you still have to have a certain amount of luck with how the balls split off the break. Keep at it man I'm sure it'll happen. I'd love to have a pool or snooker partner so I could start playing again (and the time to put in some serious training), at the moment I doubt I could string together more than a couple of pots!
 
Its surprising how much you just never forget, and its just kind of natural/instinctive, and it just needs a bit of practice for all the positional stuff to start coming back. I've improved about 200% just playing a couple of hours every month or 2 for the last few months, i had only played once or twice in about 10 years before that.

Watching Ronnie the other week helped a lot, Im sure if Id played straight after watching him Id have been better. Snooker clubs allways get busier when there's snooker on the TV, especially when the world championships are on, and if someoneone popular; alex higgins/jimmy white/ronnie o sullivan, is doing well in them.
 
Is it OK to talk about cues? Cos I recently took my precious pool/snooker cue down from the loft and discovered it to be in beautiful condition. Does anyone have any funny or interesting pool/snooker related stories? :)
 
Cant think of any very funny ones, other than as juveniles we used to take the piss out of the older members in a tiny village club, copying their mannerisms and faulty cue actions like john virgo did. Well, it was myself who did this, and made my friends laugh far too loudly, so it became obvious what i was doing. :eek: Despite that i went on to be quite well liked and welcomed in that club, by most.

On the not in the least bit funny, but vaguely interesting there was one guy who visited the club, who personally knew and played with willie thorne, and was one of the 2 players in the clubs history (in my time there) capable of making century breaks. Whenever he got above 40 the whole club (all 2 tables of it) would go quiet and stop to watch him play, which he absolutely hated as he said it increased the pressure on him massively, but no one wanted to interrupt his concentration, and it was captivating to watch an amateur player reach such heights of excellence when he was 'off on one'.

A third guy claimed to have made a 95 break on a 12 footer but no one was entirely sure that they believed him, he was much more flash in the pan brilliant, rather than consistently and sustainably good. He irked all the other members there, and i seemed to be the only person there who was friendly towards him and got on with him. Bit of a weird guy, but ive allways been drawn to weird and wonderfull people.
 
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playing snooker regularly is one of a few things i miss from when i lived in the uk. there is a pool club in emeryville, ca which has a 12 foot snooker table but i don't get down there very often now.

so i'm mostly stuck with ipad pro snooker 2012. check out my highest break:

snooker02.jpg


:)

alasdair
 
Haha, i expect the game is a fuck of a lot easier than the real thing. Strangely i tend to be better at the real thing than computerised snooker games. I was extremely on/off with yahoo pool, sometimes i could 'see' everything and would play very well, othertimes i couldnt see the angles and shots at all and kept fucking them up. The real thing ftw, whether it be pool or snooker.

As pool is so much easier and snooker is so difficult and frustrating on a 12 footer ive kind of given up on it completely for the moment, and just concentrating on pool. I wonder why they dont play snooker very much in the USA, i dont think there has ever been a succesfull American Professional snooker player, though there have been a few very successful Canadians. Really quite strange that.
 
of course it's easier :)

i think my highest break in the real game is 35 - red, black then clear the colours...

alasdair
 
mydrugbuddy said:
Haha, i expect the game is a fuck of a lot easier than the real thing. Strangely i tend to be better at the real thing than computerised snooker games. I was extremely on/off with yahoo pool.
Click to expand...

You could cheat so easily in yahoo pool by using a ruler to line up a shot using the pocket and the short guide to determine your angle :p

One of my first computer games was Jimmy White's Whirlwind Snooker on the C64 and I played it with my gran. Only other snooker game I played was one of the World Championship EA annual churn outs we had on the original xbox, back in 2005 or so. Was technically very accurate, 50 breaks were rare. It looked like arse though, although I can't say that too loud because one of the artists who made that game is my art director at the company I work at now!

It's a small world, the games industry
 
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alasdairm said:
of course it's easier :)

i think my highest break in the real game is 35 - red, black then clear the colours...

alasdair
Click to expand...

Thats good going. I made around 35 once there were a load of easy open reds around the blue spot one day, and i was cueing well enough to string more shots together than normal.
 
Bloody hell Joe Perry took his top game to Ronnie in the 2nd round of the world championships, Perry could have gone 10-6 up at one point he was playing unbeleiavably brilliantly and confidently, and that would probably have been the end of Ronnie for this years world championships, but he missed crucial chances and only took a 9-7 overnight lead. This was well within Ronnies capabalitities to retrieve. In the manner of true champions he came out in the final session in full blown genius mode, and reeled off four frames to get over the line and make the quarter final. He doesnt crumble under pressure, he thrives on it, and produces his finest stuff. This is too much for most opponents. Ronnie was playing brilliantly all alonng, but he just wasnt getting many chances to get to the table and pot balls until then. Somehow he created the chances in the home stretch. Every time he gets on a red near the black spot you know hes gonna make a fantastically stylish and beautifully controlled century break within 5 minutes or so.

So after one hell of a tough match and rising to an extreme challenge he made it through to the next round. I am gonna quit kratom next time he plays, (the 29th) i just love the guy and watching him play, i play pool myself to quite a high standard so i know how difficult what he does is, i can sort of appreciate his skills, so im sure having him to watch will help me enormously through the first 2 days of quitting. If he wins that match i will be delighted as the longer he remains in the tournament the more time it gives me under my belt for my brain to readjust and regain its natural equilibrium without bloody kratom.

Neil Roberston is also playing absolutely brilliantly this year, he's made 98 centuries so far this season alone in tournament play, completely smashing the previous record of 62 or sometthing. If he gets to the final he'll make well over 100 centuries. This is but one measure of how well he is playing, not to mention his phenominal long potting and abilty to puch home unbeleivably difficult shots to get him in the balls in the fisrt place.. Selby is also a tough opponent.

I dont want to write off everyone else and take it for granted that Ronnie will beat them. But he really should, he has his sports psycholgit Steve Peters up there in Sheffield with him now, this guy is really helping Ronnie. He has allways had the talent and abilty, but throughout his career he has struggled to maintain psycholgical consintency, which he now finally seems to have achieved, particularly this season. Suffering from bi-polar dosirder hasnt helped him, and has doubtless cost him many defeats to far lesser opponents. He hasnt lost a match at the world championships for 2 and a half years now. Not taking anything for granted but Ronnie this tournament is yours for the taking. He can equal Steve Davis and Ray Reardons 6 world titles if he wins again this year. That would put him somewhere nearer to where he belongs in the record books. Its a bit presumptious and getting ahead of things to statt talking about equalling Hendry's 7 world titles, but it is within his grasp. Ronnie is soon going to overtake Stephen Hendry's record of career century breaks; 770 odd. He could feasibly do it this year. He's allready overtaken Hendry's record of 11 maximum breaks in tournament play.

Neil Robertson will be a tough opponent if they do happen to meet in the final, (this is what all the bookies and pundits are expecting) but if they do it could be one of the best finals of all time, as the standard will probably be extremely high. It will probably be loads of one visit total clearance ten minute frames.
 
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Keep meaning to bump this thread. Pretty good championship so far. The Ronnie / Perry game was tense to say the least, amazing work in the last few frames from Ronnie, really shows how much his tactical and psychological game has come on in the last few years and he doesn't just have to rely on his epic cue skills alone now.

Haven't seen any of Robertson's matches yet so I'll stick that on this eve. I'm a supporter of Mark Allen usually, us lefties gotta stick together plus I like his controversial opinions on how the sport is managed and the fact he isn't afraid to speak out about them. Sounds like he might have his work cut out against Robertson though!
 
Im loving this years championships. The Perry match was a nail biter, i was fearing the worst at one point, when Ronnie started going for reckless doubles and leaving things on. Perry couldnt capitalise fully because of who he was playing. It's great that Robertson is also playing brilliantly, id love to see Ronnie have an easy walk in the park final, but a tough match will be much more exciting. Robertson has been well worth watching. He really is outstanding atm.

I like Mark Allen too, he definately has a rebelious streak. Allways worth watching.
 
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So Neil Robertson just got his 100th century of the season, very impressive statistic. :)
 
Very much so, but i think that there are curretly more tournaments than ever before to give the players more chances than ever of making so many centuries in a season. But even so, they all have the same opportunity and the fact that Robertson is so far ahead of everyone else must count for something.

I still cant see anyone stopping Ronnie tbh. No matter how much anyone talks the talk or psyches themselves up everyone simply seems to fall to pieces against him, just because it is him and they all know what he is capable of. He barely produced anything against Murphy but demolished him 13-3.
 
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Yeah, 6-2 up after this afternoon session. Annoying that the first two sessions of his semi are whilst I'm at work. I don't think I can get away with streaming it on my second monitor. I've been asked to work Monday (E3 looms) but have cut a deal to have the snooker on in the afternoon then :D

I still reckon it'll be a Ronnie - Selby final, but perhaps I should reserve judgement til I see how things go tonight.
 
Yeah Ronnie was gifted a couple of those crucial frames through sheer bad luck on Hawkins part with the kicks that cost him 2 frames, and Ronnie can now afford to relax a bit more with a 4 frame advantage, so i would expect him to get better and better in his s/f. Apart from Joe Perry, Ronnie seems to have been given a 'free pass' to win everything he enters this season without any serious challenges, as everyone else just falls apart playing against him.

I didnt watch the Selby Robertson match, i think I'd prefer to see Robertson vs Ronnie final, as it would probably be a much quicker and more free flowing match.

Ronnie is all freed up this morning, looks like its going to be another runaway train victory.
 
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Jesus Christ, Ronnie exceeded all expectations tonight and was absolutely fantastic playing so well, thats 2 matches finished now with a whole session to spare in each one. 8o ;)

I wonder what / if anything will be put on for viewers and the crowd with tickets for 4th semi final session that is no longer necessary. They might do a 'veterans' exhibition or something hopefully. :sus:
 
So it's gonna be Selby that plays Ronnie in the final.

What a contrast there is in their speed of play, im sure if you averaged their frame times over their careers Ronnie's would be a snappy 15 minutes or something where as Selbys would probably be 30 minutes. I think thats just the way he plays the game, and not that its an underhand tactic to throw his opponents out of their rythym or stop them ever getting one going, but thats the effect it can have. I hope Ronnie gets a chance to get on a roll but he couldn't be facing a much tougher match opponent, they stand at 3-3 in their meetings in major finals. I dont think this will be a runaway victory for Ronnie, he will really have to battle hard for this one.
 
Could end up being a very tense affair if it goes all nip and tuck. If Ronnie gets a few frames ahead though he will relax and find it a whole lot easier.
 
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