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Chapter 4. BALL-TO-BALL CONTACTS

A little thought will show that no man can calculate the exact number of ball-to-ball contacts utilized in billiard playing. They are infinite, and are the main cause of that variety which is the great charm of the game. But in a playing sense, for instructional purposes, it is usual to divide the object-ball into certain sections, and to explain what happens when the different ball-to-ball contacts are established. Figures 7-11 show a range of ball-to-ball contacts which can be practiced with every advantage. Contacts differing slightly from those shown in my diagrams are often required, and are easily comprehended and made when you are familiar with the standardized contacts now illustrated.

Full-Ball Contacts

Taking the diagrams in their numerical order, Fig. 7 shows what is known as a "full ball". This is made by striking the cue-ball so that the centre of that ball comes into contact with the centre of the object-ball. It is an easy shot, and useful for training purposes in a manner I propose to demonstrate. Place the red ball on the centre-spot of the table.

Put the cue-ball about a foot behind the red and dead in line with the centre of the middle pocket facing you. If you strike your ball clean in its centre and the red "full ball", you will pocket the red, and your ball will run on after it into the same pocket, or very nearly so. It all depends on the freedom of your cueing. If your cueing is in the least cramped, your ball, struck centrally, will scarcely run through at all, it will stop after rolling drowsily onwards for a few inches.

Mind, I do not say that you should strike your ball dead in its centre in order to make the six shot from the position now under discussion. Scoring the six points is not what I have in mind at the moment. What I want you to grasp is that if you can hit your ball in its centre, and run through after the red into the middle pocket, then you are swinging your cue with that smooth facility which you must acquire if you mean to play billiards. If you cannot do it, or even get anywhere near it, there is something radically wrong with your cueing. You must be flinching at your stroke. Your cue is not going through the ball as it should, and until you remedy this fault your billiards may get worse, but it will never get better.

The "Six Shot"

To make the six shot very easily, you must raise your cue and strike your ball high, hitting the centre of the top of the black circle shown in Fig. 3. When you do this, keep your cue level. Do not try to tilt it at one end to strike the ball high, lift it bodily, so to speak. Be very careful to strike your ball both high and truly central, or you will put on side, which may spoil everything.

Cue freely, with a nice forward swing, and if you strike your ball with force enough to send the red into the pocket with precision and celerity, you will see your ball make a distinct pause after its full contact with the red, and then rush forward with increasing speed towards the pocket. This happens because the shock of contact absorbs the initial velocity of your ball, when the strong forward spin imparted by the high striking and free cueing comes into play and makes the stroke.

This simple six shot will give you an invaluable insight into the action of "top", as it is called in billiard parlance. It possesses the peculiar power of giving your ball a fresh start after a thick contact with an object-ball, and for this reason is indispensable when you have to play a long follow-through cannon. If the object-ball is fairly close, and your ball has to travel a long way to make a cannon by means of a follow-through, you cannot make your shot without the help of "top" and plenty of it. But it is so very difficult to control "top" with any approach to precision, that I advise you never to use it indiscriminately. If you can "get through" an object-ball by free cueing, and a central cue-contact with the cue-ball, by all means do so, especially when playing for a pocket.

The six shot we are now dealing with for practice purposes is a little misleading in this respect. The pocket is as "open" as it can be, the balls are in true line, and it is easy to follow through into the pocket by striking your ball high. But if the cue-ball were a little out of the straight line, and the red were closer to the pocket, you would be able to run through with much more certainty by using free cueing and central ball striking, a method which you should always adopt in such cases.

The Screw-Back "Six Shot"

Still keeping the red and the cue-ball in the same position, and continuing with a dead full ball-to-ball contact, I want you to practice an entirely different six shot. I am asking you to pot the red in one middle pocket and screw straight back into the other. This brings us to a ball movement of a fresh nature.

We have to strike the cue-ball in such a way that it will run forward, hit the red full, and then recoil back into the pocket. It will pay you to think for a moment about this, when you will see that your ball must carry backward spin, or it will never come back into the pocket. This may seem too self-evident to need pointing out, but my experience as a billiard coach teaches me that if a pupil understands what he has to do and why he has to do it, the battle is more than half won, the actual execution being rendered so much easier by a complete understanding of the theory of the shot. Very well, aim to strike your ball at the lowest point of the black circle in Fig. 3.

Keep your cue as level as you can-do not raise your butt and depress your cue-tip when imparting screw. Now, strike your ball freely and confidently-let your cue go through the ball just enough to set the backward rotation going, and then check it, bringing it to a sudden stop. The check must be sharp and decided, but until it operates you must let the weight of the cue do the work as usual.

The best way to check the cue is to pinch the butt hard, thus bringing the whole forward swing of the stroke to an end with almost a jar. Do this, and you cannot fail to make your ball screw-back, provided you have hit the ball in the right place. At first, I do not suppose for a moment that you will be able to screw straight back into the pocket for your six shot. This is by no means a big screw-back, but it is a very stiff proposition for a novice. When you can pot the red in one middle pocket, and screw back into the other with ease and certainty, you might play many thousands of points without ever being faced by a screw shot beyond your power of cue.

Raising the Butt and the "Jab" Shot

I have not finished with this six shot position, although I do not wish you to score the six shot just now. Put the balls up as usual, raise the butt of your cue a little, and come down on your ball with a heavy, jab-like action, the direct opposite of the swing I have said so much about. Note the result; you will "stab" the red into the pocket, but your ball will scarcely move, it may even stop dead on the very spot previously occupied by the red ball.

This is a very useful stroke in its way. In billiards it is used when you want to pot the red and leave your ball in or near the position of the coloured ball; but it is in much more frequent request in snooker and other pool games. Just now, however, I want you to observe how raising the butt and jabbing at the ball deadens the run of the cue-ball, and I am particularly anxious that you shall understand that this effect is always present when the butt is raised and the cueing is stiff; and, mark this, it takes very little of it to spoil any ordinary stroke.

Over and over again do I have to caution my pupils against raising the cue-butt and handling it more or less as if it were a kitchen poker, so you must pardon me for insisting so strongly concerning it. Personally, I think it is merely silly for people to expect to have the balls put on the table and be taught to make all sorts of shots before they even know how to swing a cue properly. The thing cannot be done, take my word for it, and I have had some hundreds of pupils through my hands.

The Effect of "Side"

Once again I want you to put the balls up for the six shot, but you will not play for it. I want you to pot the red in the middle pocket, a perfectly straight shot, first with as much right-hand side on your ball as you can put on it, and then with as much left-hand side as you can impart. This particular shot is merely to prove something to you, so I do not mind how hard you play or where the cue-ball goes. All I ask you to do is to pot the red with strong side on your ball as directed. What is the result? Do you not find it much more difficult to pot the red? Of course you do, and that is all I want you to discover and bear in mind.

Do not practise the stroke after you have made it once or twice-I have only asked you to do it to show you that the moment you put side on your ball you find it harder to hit the object-ball correctly than when you strike your ball centrally.

Cue Line and Stroke Line

The reason for this is two-fold, but only one aspect matters in the stroke you have played. This is that when you pot the red by striking your ball in its centre, the line of your cue and the line of the stroke are the same. They must be, because the line of every stroke is taken from the centre of the cue-ball. But when you put side on your ball, you must move your cue to the right or left of the centre of your ball, which means that the line of your cue and the line of the stroke are no longer identical.

In effect, you are estimating your stroke along one line and swinging your cue on another parallel to it. You must do this every time you put side on a ball, and your stroke, especially if it is a winning hazard, becomes automatically more difficult than it would be if you struck your ball centrally.

Ball "Turn" and its Effect

In addition, there is the important fact that side makes a ball turn if it has any distance to travel before striking the object-ball. This turning tendency is of no practical account if your ball is moving quickly, but if you play a slow or slowish ball with strong side on a woollen cloth, the ball will turn in the direction of the side when running with the nap, and in the contrary direction when running against the nap. On a napless cloth, the ball always turns in the direction of the side it carries. Do not think this is a refinement you need not bother about. It makes a lot of difference when your ball has a long way to go, and an appreciable difference at what may be called medium ranges. To prove this, put the red ball almost touching the top cushion and four or five inches from the left-hand top pocket. If you aim to hit the red a 'o' full ball," and put as much left side on your ball as you can, you actually see your ball turn as it travels slowly up the table, and finishes by just clipping the red beautifully, and leaving it in good position as the cue-ball darts into the pocket. Quite a pretty shot, and a good one when you want it, but at the moment I wish you to study it to learn how much you have to allow for your ball departing from a straight line owing to the influence of side.

Only use Side when Necessary

Consequently, whenever you use side, you have to swing your cue parallel to the true line of the stroke, and to allow for your ball "running off" if you play at all slowly at such a range that your ball has room in which to "spin away". You can do all this, but you do not want to volunteer for it. Therefore, never use side if you can possibly do without it. The idea that a "bit of side" makes a stipulated shot easier must be accepted with caution, and always rejected if you can make the shot and leave good position by plain ball striking. Of course, there are strokes, plenty of them, where side must be used; but there are many on the border line, and "when in doubt ignore side" is the motto for you. The fact that "a bit of side" may help a ball into a pocket does not begin to compensate you for the complications you have to allow for and contend with when side is employed, and, I repeat, do not use it unless you are confident that you really need it.

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