Snooker

Snooker is the name of the non-standard type of pool invented by Edwin Alfred Snooker of Britain. Snooker is played with a pool and sometimes other ball styles, such as billiards and pool. It is similar to pool but with a twist: Unlike pool, Snooker allows a ball to carry off-side “crooks”. Snooker is often played in what is known as ‘Chinese Pool’ or ‘Euro Snooker’. For instance, snooker is the game in which it is common to play three reds with a pocket, and two blues with an off-side crook off the side.

It is related to billiards, but differs in several key respects, for example:

Unlike pool, the difficulty of scoring (counting out snooker balls) is decreased because reds and blues move off-side more frequently than they do in pool.

The game is played on a narrow rectangular pool table (known as a snooker table), instead of a much larger pool table (known as a billiard table) and it is possible to play more than one game at once.

A player may score a point by ‘snooker’ the opponent’s ball. Off-side play in snooker is referred to as opposed to the double over rule in pool.

The game moves at a faster pace than pool.

Snooker and Pool have an intuitively similar style of play. Snooker is often called pool for the convenience of the play, and the usage may be commonplace for informal play. On a rectangle table, snooker is played with five balls. Players use a cue stick to hit the five coloured balls on the pool table and in play they may also use other types of snooker balls such as billiard balls, tap, drop, bombs, breakers, snooker sticks, snooker balls with shafts in the two colours (red and blue) and off-side play.

Pool offers a far broader range of scoring techniques, although the rules aren’t always obvious. In general, a player cannot score the same stroke twice.

Snooker is considered a distinctly ‘English’ game because the association of snooker is much older than pool. Though pool had evolved in Britain, for most of the time that snooker has existed there was not a sport with a single governing body. Until 1952, pool, pool pool and snooker were all called “pool” in England.

It was not until about the 1920s that snooker was created as a variation of pool. The British Billiards Association (later called the English Billiards and Snooker Association) formed in 1922 with a few notable figures in snooker, such as Willie Smith, Billy Warren and Joseph Jackson. Before the formation of the British Snooker Association, the rules of snooker and pool were sometimes conflicting. The confusion was caused because in both pool and snooker the cue ball is played in the same manner, but in pool the cue ball travels with respect to the pocket/table and the off-side crooks. In relation to the table and, on occasion, the pocket/table, the cue ball travels off-side.

Why does the game of pool have two such specific names?

Because of some variances in the rules, the terminology is different. The terms pool and pool are derived from the differences in table measurements. Pool is played on a rectangular pool table, much like the ‘modern’ pool table. Pool is also known as pool play, pot play, potable play, potable play, snooker play, snooker, pool, potable pool, or potable play. Pool is most often played on a pool table (sometimes it is called ‘pool play’).

Pool is played with eight balls in the four colours and the pattern can be off-side play, double over rule, or double over rule.

The first ball of each frame is rolled in the play area between the legs of the two players, where a designated player takes his cue and hits the ball by the top left hand corner of the table. The player may make his stroke without snooker sticks, billiard balls, and even a snooker stick; only pool balls may be used in snooker. Snooker sticks are deemed illegal, though they are sometimes used. If snooker is played with pool balls, the player who hits the cue ball must play pool in the following frames (unless there is a break or double over).

That is why pool has both one specific name and another much more informal one.

Pool and snooker in London

Pool and snooker have a long history in England. At one point in the 1800s snooker was played under the name ‘pool’. Because of this, the game of pool is referred to as snooker in England. It is believed that snooker became a game because pool players were getting tired of playing one game of snooker and another game of pool.

Pool is a prominent sport in the city of London. Billiard rooms usually have a pool table and the matches are usually played in the off-side area of the billiard table.

Snooker is more popular and more active in the countryside. Some of the snooker clubs and bars that are active in the UK have snooker as a major sport and at times snooker is even played as a two-day championship. This has a long history. Snooker clubs in England started to play snooker in the 17th century, and the first recorded match of snooker was in the early 1800s. In 1910, the British Snooker Association was formed and they officially played the first official snooker championship, which was won by George Francis Wood.