BILLIARDS.

Taranaki Daily News, 17 December 1926, Page 4

BILLIARDS.

BRIGHTER BILLIARDS. (From Our Own Correspondent.) London, Nov. 4. Tho two great billiard rivals, Tom Newman, the champion, and Willie Smith, have quarrelled, and are, as is generally known, not to meet this season even in the championship. The latter has already annonuced that he will not compete for the event, and as Stevenson has almost dropped out, and Unman and Reece have fallen so far down the playing scale that they are no match for the leaders without u long start, the professional side of the game is passing through poor and unprofitable times. The matches which have been played, particularly in London, have been very meagrely supported and the incomes of the men have been seriously depleted. What could be done to bring about ar revival? Inman has come out with a plea for what he calls “Brighter billiards.'’ The public, he declares, are tired of seeing big breaks and in order to restrict these he has proposed that the pocket of the table should be reduced in size to 3j inches, and he has challenged Newman to a match under these conditions with a start of three thousand in sixteen, thousand. Of course, it is only a stunt to bring about more interest in the doings of the professionals and no one lias accepted the challenge as anything else. Newman has accepted, and the conditions will be greatly in his favour owing to his genius in making long sequences of nursery cannons. Indeed, as compared wth Inman, he makes comparatively little use of the losing hazard, and so the game with a smaller poeket is bound to be easier for him than his opponent. Owing to the shortage of players, J. Earlam, who won the amateur championship last season and then turned professional, is getting plenty of opportunities. But in the matches in which he has opposed Smith and Newman he has been completely outclassed and there is no doubt that he is being tried too highly. Though he has marked natural talents Earlam is not at present up-to the second grade professional standard, and it would have been better if he had been allowed to gain experience in this section.