Big pockets

[missneworleans]

John Higgins was in our club for a visit very recently and while there played 3 frames against one of our up and coming young players who has already been in the final of the European Under 19's, has played in a number of international events for Scotland over the last few years, has had a 147 in a practice match, plays as an amateur in the PTC's etc. so is quite a handy player.

John made 3 consecutive centuries, never missed a ball.

thats scottish club+ no pressure
i mean in my club if you roll ball along the cushion, if it catches the jaw, never will go in, on any pace

[magicman]

On the contrary, as anyone knows when they've seen pro's play exhibitions at snooker clubs. They knock in centuries after centuries and often maximums.

I think the reasons are, as Terry said, the 'slippiness' of a new cloth, the optical illusion of the pocket cameras and people's inability to comprehend just exactly how good these guys really are!

[DeeZiZ]

Of course TV tables will always have more generous pockets.
Remember the infamous black by Dale in Australia earlier this season. Can't believe that dropped.
Also, I played myself and had several people I know play on the PTC tv table, and yes, they are tremendous.
We just sucked.

So sick of Dennis Taylor every time he has the opportunity to mention 'how tight these pockets are'. Just STFU Dennis.

[Gerry Armstrong]

thats scottish club+ no pressure
i mean in my club if you roll ball along the cushion, if it catches the jaw, never will go in, on any pace

I'm sure he'd be more than capable of 3 consecutive tons in your club too as would almost all of the top pros.

[missneworleans]

I'm sure he'd be more than capable of 3 consecutive tons in your club too as would almost all of the top pros.

you havent been there ...
i'm not understating players, but pockets are way more generous, thats true for sure

[Deepscrew]

If anyone thinks the middle pockets on the Star tables are anything like as generous as club tables they are quite clearly on some mind altering substances.

The players are just THAT good.

[missneworleans]

cmon its obvious that those pockets are way more generous than in clubs...no camera trick, some balls i have seen going down never would drop in my club
the cloth is newer and gets brushed in intervals..
stilll i'm not understating players....

[Gerry Armstrong]

you havent been there ...
i'm not understating players, but pockets are way more generous, thats true for sure

They're not, but don't let facts get in the way of your argument.

[cazmac1]

Couple of things I'd like to add
1. Not all club tables are the same so we can't know for sure how tight a table is at any given club so if someone says it's tight we should accept that and not just put it down to them not being as good as a pro ( although this is certainly true).
2. With regards to camera angles when they play a long red into the yellow pocket the camera gives a near to a players view as you can get and you see the ball hit the extreme right of the pocket with plenty of daylight to the left and the pocket still sucks the ball in.
I can only repeat what I said earlier them balls would not go in on my table. One final point is that I have never played a bad game on a match cut table and would say that my form is actually better. So for me the facts speak for them selves.
PS
Neil can't wait to get on that star table.

[cally]

You'll see how tight these stars play setup to WPBSA specs then bud, they are tight man, dont be fooled...

Try a few shots across the back rail, phew.. killers they are...

[nrage]

Couple of things I'd like to add
1. Not all club tables are the same so we can't know for sure how tight a table is at any given club so if someone says it's tight we should accept that and not just put it down to them not being as good as a pro ( although this is certainly true).
2. With regards to camera angles when they play a long red into the yellow pocket the camera gives a near to a players view as you can get and you see the ball hit the extreme right of the pocket with plenty of daylight to the left and the pocket still sucks the ball in.
I can only repeat what I said earlier them balls would not go in on my table. One final point is that I have never played a bad game on a match cut table and would say that my form is actually better. So for me the facts speak for them selves.
PS
Neil can't wait to get on that star table.

#1 You're dead right. And Frames has a star table and a 100 year old table (was it a brunswich anniversary table Neil?), which Neil tells me has tighter pockets than the star table.

#2 You would expect the pocket to accept a pot hitting the right of this pocket, but not the left (near jaw). The amount of daylight is the only factor really. At slower speeds you'd expect to pot with more daylight, than at faster speeds. I can't recall seeing an example of one which I would not have expected to pot.. there were a few to the black pockets which looked very borderline to me, and they wobbled and I was a bit surprised they dropped, but TBH they would have dropped at that pace on all the tables I've played on.

I find I play better on the tighter tables too, but perhaps that is because they are also more consistent in speed, bounce, etc and with a thinner cloth you get less roll off. If the cloth is faster, you can hit softer and we're all more accurate at lower speeds. Also, knowing the pockets are tighter makes us play more carefully, and concentrate more. If we approached every shot on every table like that I reckon we'd be even better on the loose pocketed tables.

It would be good to meet/see you down at Frames and maybe play a frame to two

[cazmac1]

Hi nrage, when I come down to frames I'll bring my video cam and i'll film the session.

[tornado taylor]

Another good point from cazmac. Club tables vary so much. I play on an old billiard table and the worst thing about that is, when the ball is in the jaw of the pocket your bridge hand is virtually on the cue ball and the same for a shot off the rail where a proper match table has wider rails and more room to cue. Still a nice table to play on though and its cheap at 2 pound an hour.

[nrage]

Hi nrage, when I come down to frames I'll bring my video cam and i'll film the session.

Good idea

[sunny3909]

One of the clubs where I play regularly has got 3 star tables,the center pockets are tight,when the cloth was new the shots along the cushion were a bit easy but after 3 months the pockets don't seem that generous for these kind of shot.
It must be something to do with the fineness of the cloth as Terry mentioned.