Miss rule in local leagues
I play in 2 leagues in York and neither use the miss rule. People say it will create arguments and generally don't want it. I witnessed a match (1 frame) a couple of weeks ago where there was a total of about 10 deliberate misses. Both players were of senior age and have clearly been playing for many decades, in other words they know the angles and knew what they were doing. The point was they were snookering each other, and sacrificing 4 points in order to leave the table safe but were making it look like "a good attempt" to escape. One scenario involved the last 2 reds touching in the middle of the table, so if the one snookered hit the reds they would open them up and possibly leave a chance so it was better to leave them as they were and force the opponent to open them.
Of course you can't expect the miss rule to be applied in local league as it is in the professional game because every failed escape is called a miss and the players are the best in the world, therefore they should be able to escape from any snooker barring the impossible ones.
I'm curious to know how those of you who play in local leagues deal with deliberate misses.
I have a suggestion I'd like the people of York to consider and it consists of 3 basic concepts:
1) If the player can see the ball on and misses
2) If the player chooses a more difficult escape than the obvious route in order to leave a safe table if they miss (e.g. turning down going into the pack of reds instead playing to land on a loose one in a safe position close to a cushion)
3) If the player blatantly makes no attempt to hit the ball on, similar to a "push out" in 9 ball pool (e.g. plays away from the ball on to a safe spot on the table)
These wouldn't apply to all deliberate misses, for example a player plays the obvious escape route but plays to "only just miss" the object ball. In such a scenario you can't expect club players reffing the match to be consistent. But using the above 3 rules I think it wouldn't be too hard for everyone to understand and wouldn't cause too many arguments, and most importantly it would stop the practice of deliberately fouling to gain an advantage.
Of course you can't expect the miss rule to be applied in local league as it is in the professional game because every failed escape is called a miss and the players are the best in the world, therefore they should be able to escape from any snooker barring the impossible ones.
I'm curious to know how those of you who play in local leagues deal with deliberate misses.
I have a suggestion I'd like the people of York to consider and it consists of 3 basic concepts:
1) If the player can see the ball on and misses
2) If the player chooses a more difficult escape than the obvious route in order to leave a safe table if they miss (e.g. turning down going into the pack of reds instead playing to land on a loose one in a safe position close to a cushion)
3) If the player blatantly makes no attempt to hit the ball on, similar to a "push out" in 9 ball pool (e.g. plays away from the ball on to a safe spot on the table)
These wouldn't apply to all deliberate misses, for example a player plays the obvious escape route but plays to "only just miss" the object ball. In such a scenario you can't expect club players reffing the match to be consistent. But using the above 3 rules I think it wouldn't be too hard for everyone to understand and wouldn't cause too many arguments, and most importantly it would stop the practice of deliberately fouling to gain an advantage.
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