Snooker
A Snook is an old military term for a first year officer cadet, the word Snooker is believed to have come from a statement made by an officer to a cadet after they had paled a particularly poor shot during a game of Billiards. Billiards being a favourite past of Army officers serving in India as the waited for the Monsoon rains to subside.
So Snooker is a derivation of the much older game of Billiards, in fact the first official Snooker tournament wasn’t played until the mid 1910’s and even then the game had quite a small following and was played very much as amateurs, the first professional snooker "Star" was Joe Davis, who had also help establish the first professional world championships.
Snooker suffered quite a decline in popularity during the 50’s and 60’s the great revival, and the beginnings of what we know as professional snooker today, is attributed to the BBC programme Pot Black which was aired to show off the advantages of the colour television set, snooker in black and white isn’t quite as easy to follow!
With the advent of a wider TV audience and heavy sponsorship by the tobacco industry, remember the Embassy Snooker World Championships? Snooker gained a whole new fan base and interest from the betting fraternity. Snooker has one advantage over other sports when it comes to betting, there’s always a winner and a loser – draws don’t happen, so the simplest bet to be made would be on the winner of a particular match, obviously the odds on a two horse race doesn’t give much scope to the skilled gambler. Far more interesting are bets placed on individuals to win a tournament, don’t expect great odds on Ronnie O’Sullivan to win the Snooker World Championship at the Crucible Theatre in 2009 though. His greatest rivals at the moment are Stephen Maguire and Shaun Murphy so they could be worth an early punt.
Gamblers are very creative when it comes to placing bets, always looking for an unusual angle to increase both the interest in a tournament but also the odds. Betting on who will make the highest break or the most number of snookers are all bets that have been tried, but beware as in all gambling, skill and knowledge can only get you so far, luck and the unexpected also play a part.
