BILLIARDS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 23, 7 December 1910, Page 8

BILLIARDS.

HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH CHAMPIONSHIP. Nearly all the glory of billiards lies in the championship, by virtue of possessing which title the billiard expert becomes the recognised master of his profession. In the long history of billiards since it developed into an accepted sport of the people, the recurring fights for the premier position have never failed to draw their full meed of patronage and attention (says an expert in the “London Daily Telegraph”). There were matches of this description some time before the first British billiard champion, in one Carr, a West of England marker, who first displayed an intimate knowledge, with ability to put this into execution, with the various effects that different impacts of the cue-tip could impart to the cue-ball. Then came the era of the champions of unquestioned merit. The first accepted member of the line was one Jonathan Kentfield, a Sussex man, ■whose sphere of action was confined to Brighton. Kentfield was a champion in his own right, a devout student of his art, and by all the proofs he has nanded down to the present generation of players, he was all that he claimed to be. The billiard chronicler of those days, a fine amateur authority, Air. Ernest Mardon, writes in unmeasured eulogy of his champion’s ability. He gives him a record of 176, almost exclusively pieced together by spot-stroke hazards, a form of play which was even then, in the “hungry ’forties” the dominating factor in breakmaking and the cult of the ardent billiard student. Air. Mardon further says: “Were I to relate all the extraordinary performances of Air. Kentfield, the reader would imagine I was bordering on romance. On one occasion, when playing the winning game” (pot-shots or winning hazards only counting to the striker, and other strokes, cannons, or in-offs being deducted from hie total) “of 21 points up, he gave his opponent 18 points start, and won sixteen successive games. “In playing the winning and losing game of 24 points up, he won ten games, his adversary never scoring. “At another time he was playing the non-cushion game, 16 up. On starting off, he twisted his ball into a top corner pocket off the red, and won in that man-

ner six games, his adversary not having a stroke. “Desirous of ascertaining how many games of 24 up could be played within the hour, he commenced the task with a player of considerable eminence; and they completed thirty games within the specified time. “Forty-seven games of 100 up were also played in eight hours and a-half. “In a match that did not exceed 200 games he beat his opponent eighty-five ‘love’ games.” ADVENT OF JOHN ROBERTS, SEN. But what would this enthusiastic historian of billiards have said had he been given a foresight of a billiard development long before the Victorian epoch had closed, that bred breaks in their thousands, with scores of players making their 200 and 300 breaks spotbarred? Yet such was the case. Kentfield’s supremacy lasted from 1825 to 1847. Some time ere it had run its course there were rumours, gradually receiving proper corroboration, of a new star rising in the North country. This was the coming force in billiards, bearing a name which still rings throughout the billiard world—John Roberts, the elder, a truly gifted man, who owed his rise to natural genius, as opposed to Kentfield’s very precise harmonising of sound theory with the best available practice, his own. Before dismissing Kentfield and his times, it must not ho overlooked that he showed how closely he had looked into the needs of the game by recommending the introduction of rubber cushions and slate beds. Until he thus declared for progress in keeping with the refinements of the play, the cushions were formed of list (a kind of felt), aud the balls rumbled over wooden boards. Neither of these most urgent first essentials was adapted to high-class play, which asks for life and extreme sensitiveness in every detail. Alodern billiardists owe much to tha clear perception and inventive nature of Kentfield, who may be esteemed as tha pioneer of billiards in its present highlyordered state. Tlie persistence of John Roberts, the! elder, eventually placed him upon tha championship pedestal, vice Kentfield, who resigned in the year 1847, after having turned a deaf ear to the many challenges levelled at him by his successor. Highly as the Sussex man hadl been considered, Roberts attained to an even greater notoriety; and the belief in his invincibility became a settled conviction. From 1847 until 1870, the Lancashire man stood forth as the leading figure in the world of English billiards. His rooms at Savile House (which stood on the site of the present Empire Theatra in Leicester Square) was the chief resort in town. Savile House fostered andi trained to his calling, as it turned out, an even greater billiard luminary than its redoubtable master. Roberts’ eldest son, John Roberts, junior, the present remarkable cueist, who in his 64th year recently made a break of 651 during tha course of a match with Fred Lindrum (another youthful Australian phenomenon), served his apprenticeship to tha billiard table at Savile House. John Roberts relinquished his twentythree years’ grip upon the championship when he met William Cook (the father of the present expert bearing this name) in what was really the first match for tha title. Cook, who was barely one and twenty years of age, had for some twelve months been regarded as the coming forca in company with John Roberts,_jun. Ha had scored two breaks, 351 and 359, either of which had wiped out Roberts’s record of 346, achieved in the early sixties. This latter performance was extolled to tha skies, and its chief asset, 104 spot hazards, mentioned in the Press as bordering upon the miraculous. The game was certainly making rapid strides in scoring development. Curiously enough, Cook relied almost entirely upon the spot; stroke to win the title from the veteran holder. That the latter appreciated this fact was to be found in the stipulation made for. a “championship table" set with very tight 3in. pockets, with the spots marked 12.)in. from the face of the top cushion instead of the then regulation distance of 13Jin and the present day IZJIn The match —one of 1200 points up for £5OO a side and the championship—was played at the old St, James’s Hall, Piccadilly, on February 11, 1870. Both players were frequently at a loss with tho tight pockets. But, staying the longer, Cook gained a victory by 117 points after Roberts had led at 1041 to 1037. Just two months later John Roberts, jun., Avenged his father’s defeat by securing

the championship from Cook in a game of 1000 points up, which he won by 478 points. A DAZZLING PLAYER. For fifteen years, until 1885, it was a moot point as to whether Cook or Roberts, jun., was the leader of the billiard profession. First impressions favoured Cook, who, after recovering the title from lis most dangerous rival made much improvement, as testified by a break of 936 from his daintily-plied cue. He resisted all the efforts of young Roberts, then a slap dash player lacking the finer touches which were subsequently to become his speciality, and others of his contemporaries for several years. His delicate methods served as a guiding example to and, incorporating them into his own more robust methods, he became the undisputed champion and the most determined match player the billiard-room had hitherto known. For a full fifteen years—exactly the same period he had passed through in establishing his championship claim — from 1885 to 1900, he bewitched the amateur enthusiasts with his dazzling displays, his tenure of the Egj-p--tion Hall, Piccadilly, standing as a triumphant vindication of his outstanding talents. Roberts set his face against the spot stroke, urging that its monotony robbed the game of spectacular charm. At the time the spot-stroke phenomenon W. J. Peall, was at his zenith, and scoring breaks by the thousand points, with a 3304 effort as the high-water mark of all his big doings. In the eighties and nineties, the days of the Roberts ascendancy, there were two styles of game in force, namely, the “ spot-barred ” and the " all in.” The leading light adopted the “ spot-barred ” eode, which included the odious push stroke,” a foul back-ing-up of the cue-ball infringing the first principle of the play. Under these spotbarred rules Roberts scored a break of 1392 points. But with the putting forward of a revised code in 1898 that practically put the game in the shape it owns to-day, the spot and push strokes being eliminated, the dimensions of the breaks dropped in corresponding ratio, 500 points, as now, requiring the best attentions of the crack cuemen of the day. Towards the latter end <sf his reign Roberts was made the subject of challenges from the then rising player, Chas. Dawson, a young Y’orkshireman, who, after graduating as a spot-stroke expert, had contrived to adapt his game to the spot-barred requirements, minus the push shot. Dawson created no small sensation when offering to play Roberts on level terms for a substantial money stake and the whole of the receipts. After much pressure the champion agreed to meet him, but with the express stipulation that the championship was not called into question. Roberts won the match by somewhere about 2000 points. It proved to be his last big encounter for seven or eight years, as deciding upon a world’s tour with the advent of the new century, the popular billiard idol left the field to Dawson and the younger professionals, of whom Stevenson was far and away the most promising. The Billiard Association praiseworthily inaugurated a championship to take the place of the old ehampionship cup held by Roberts. It carried an endowment of £lOO a year to the holder. For a full five years thero was an intense rivalry existing between Dawson and Stevenson; the former had the best of matters for the greater part of this period. But he was standing stationary, whereas Stevenson, nearly ten years the younger, was palpably improving; and in the course of a series of matches Dawson was passed in the race for supremacy. The game which effectu-

ally set at rest the vexed question waa one fraught with the most important issues. It took place in the early part of 1905. John Roberts had returned to England; and, in reply to challenges from either side, the veteran left his two most dangerous rivals to decide between themselves, on the billiard table, which of them had the right to meet him. Stevenson won the game in brilliant fashion, scoring a record break of 802 points, and qualifying to meet Roberts in a memorable match at the Caxton Hall, Westminster. Since that event Stevenson, if losing by slightly more points than Roberts had coneeded him, has been looked upon as the outstanding exponent of English billiards, both at home and abroad. He has done much to justify the exalted opinion held of his abilities, notably in the 1908-9 season, following upon his return from a tour through Australia, New Zealand, and India, during which he touched the Straits Settlements, China, and Japan. So far ahead was he of all his rivals, and with Dawson temporarily in retirement, that Stevenson, at the close of the red-lettered campaign of his career, offered to concede any of them one-third of the game start. That cartel was given forth less than eighteen months ago; and in that comparatively short space of time, as showing the extraordinary march of progress in first-class bililards, a player has been found, in Melbourne Inman, for long a minor light, who has climbed up the ladder of fame, step by step, from the very lowest rung. When it became known at the back end of last year that Inman anil Reece were the only challengers to Stevenson’s right to hold further the title of champion, a distinct impression of the futility of such opponents attempting to dispossess him of his honours was felt. As events proved, however, Stevenson never found touch with his best form, and Inman, after disposing of Reeee in the first round, completed the best season's work that he had ever known by putting up a great fight against the champion. ° For nine of the twelve days allotted to the 18,000 up there was little to choose between the holder and his challenger, alter the former had early on looked’ like drawing right ahead. Inman, as is his wont, hung doggedly on, and when the death of Stevenson’s wife occurred, and caused a sudden stoppage to a most interesting situation, the champion was less than 200 points ahead with only three further days’ play to be undergone. By mutual consent the match was declared null and void, Inman displaying good sportsmanship in foregoing his undoubted, right to have claimed the championship. During the summer respite the Billiards Control Club Council decided that the replay should take place at the Holborn Town Hall. Stevenson and Inman meeting over the regulation championship course of 18,000 points up.