When i was growing up one of our favorite things to do was to rent the snooker table for a couple of hours and have a great Saturday afternoon knocking the balls about. I used to go up with my friend Arie Eric De Jong, a fantastic snooker player and someone who I thought had a pretty good chance of becoming a decent amateur. Over the years however this is sadly something which we have lost and there are less snooker halls than ever before.
I think that this is just such a great sport and here is why I believe that we should push for more people to be playing this fantastic game.
All Ages
There is nothing to stop people of any age playing sport, but there are some which are viewed as being a young or an old person’s game. This is not the case with snooker at all and as I have played over the years I have played against a wide range of people from all backgrounds and of all ages. This is a sport which is very inclusive indeed.
No Elitism
Snooker is a game with tight rules and a certain air of etiquette, much like golf or tennis is. My experience of snooker however, is that it is not an elitist sport like the other two mentioned, there is a far more accepting nature about this sport and that means that no matter who you are, you can play.
Spending Time
An average game of snooker amongst friends may take around 35 minutes or more, so if you go up with a friend and play a couple of games, you can guarantee that you are going to be spending a couple of hours in someone’s company. When you compare this to a game like pool, that is a much faster game and it offers far less time to enjoy someone’s company.
Strategy
Snooker is a hard game to play and it is very different from pool, you need to focus on strategy and that is why it is a great sport to play. The likes of pool does have an element of strategy but there is much less to consider when you play your shots. With snooker, the angles are very different and the way in which you add pace or action to the ball will have a much bigger impact.
Exciting
This is a genuinely exciting game and whilst it may not be fast paced, there is still a lot of fun to be had. For example the key is to get the highest points, during that you may have breaks where you go on a run of potting balls, and then racking up your total. The goal the next time is to beat that top score, and this is where a lot of the excitement comes from.
This is a great game and I think we should aim to make it more popular than it currently is.
