@@JongleurJ10 Or even that the world finalist of 1940, the final edition before the Second World War, played the world champion of 2022, the first edition to be played in front of an audience in its entirety after the Covid pandemic...
Knowing Fred he was walking back to Alex's seat. I loved the way he just left the rest on the table, didn't even think about putting it away himself, or even handing it to Len Ganley, proper old school.
Doesn't get much better than this. Dickie Davies, Higgins, Davis & the icing on top, Len "Crush Your Balls" Ganley. It certainly was the Golden Age of Snooker...
@@1977ajax There is no way that you can say that Higgins heard him say green. He wouldn't have been watching. He'd have been fiddling with his fag packet or his towel.
@@1977ajax You didn't hear it, I didn't hear it, Alex didn't hear it and most of all, the referee didn't hear it. And do you know why the people mentioned didn't hear it? Because he didn't say it.
There used to be footage on YT of Fred compiling a big century break v a Kirk Stevens in a World Championship, cant find it any more so I shall enjoy this in its place.
Amazing how with such grit and determination he makes it happen but it's not just that, he has a very complex and high level recollection database in his mind where each shot where he needs a particular effect in order to pocket the ball and play position, he has a high level grasp of what gaff to flick or jerk in with all that tension that he plays with and that's the most amazing part because he's turned what is very inconsistent into consistency because he just knows the deep feel for so many different alignments and body positions..... There's no way that sheer will and determination gets it done, there has to be a deep grasp of command and with his style there are so many different things to remember.... The concentration level in order to recollect that checklist where if he forgets one thing the shot is ruined.... It's quite incredible.
Have a look at Higgins 2 century breaks against terry griffiths in 1979 pure excitement. He was really buzzing☺ went on to lose 10-9 Alex lost loads of matches he should of won. Left me gutted many times when I was a kid. RIPALEX
Those who compare the game then to the way it is now don't realise the impact the early TV snooker had on my generation. The modern standard may be stronger but for me the magic disappeared from the game a long time ago. Give me Reardon, Higgins, Fred & Cliff Wilson anyday!
The magic of Cliff Wilson😂 Don’t forget the wizardry of Perrie Mans who sadly never scored a single century in his career or the sorcery of Graham Miles who had that way of cueing where his cue was about 6 inches to the side of his chin. Those were the days.
Interesting what the commentator said about Higgins @4:42 It was almost exactly what Ray Reardon said about Higgins between sessions when he played him. Almost sounds like he had some "help" before the second sessions?
Do you have the interview that Alex did after a match with Fred Davis ( I think it was at a uk championship) Alex and Fred held hands after Alex jokingly said to Fred “why don’t you lay down and die”…. Alex had great respect and admiration for Fred.
Marvelous find. Alex at his peak, Fred's character coming out even though he only played about five shots and the irreplaceable Len Ganley refereeing, one of the few refs to have made century breaks. Oh, and Dickie Davies before his hair went weird. What's not to like?
I must've missed a lot of that. Incidents involving disputing his rivals, complaining about referees, throwing knitted toys into the audience every time he lost a frame during his major exit in 1990... He was well liked, and admonished, but calling him a gentleman is a bit of a stretch I think.
How the hell did Higgins play like that, it's like natural talent personified.That black at the end, when he whips it in with his whole body, and all the mad shots slammed in like it's nothing with tons of side and spin. This guy made the game, funny to think Fred Davis didn't want more pros in at the time. It's alright of him to sit there and smile like a benign old man but while he and his brother were custodians of the professional game and won about 30 world titles combined snooker was going nowhere, it took Higgins to make snooker popular
I was unaware that the historical record ever showed Fred complaining about the new group of professionals. Everything I've read/seen shows Fred being complimentary to the new players throughout the 1970s and 1980s. He was upset about changes made to billiards during the early 1980s revival but that wasn't directed at players. I also don't think it's accurate to blame Joe or Fred for the decline of the sport in the 1960s. Fred retired after Snooker Plus didn't take off, the world title was defended on a dreary challenge basis that the public wasn't interested in, and exhibitions dried up. They didn't have a governing body or enough organization to have good national exposure. All of snooker benefitted from the world title going back to the knockout format in 1969, the establishment of the WPBSA in 1971, and the emergence of Pot Black and color TV coverage. If we don't have all of those elements, we don't get to enjoy clips like these of The Hurricane in full flow. It's a shame the evolution didn't happen a little faster so we could see film of Higgins winning the world title in 1972.
@@johnburris4212 Hi John I don't think it could have happened faster, or sooner. Yes all those things you describe may well have benefitted the snooker players, but most of those players could never have inspired the new generation, IMO that came from Higgins singlehandedly.
@@johnburris4212 it is described in documentaries about snooker history. i think their idea was, well, there's not much money in this game, what are we doing trying to spread it around more? they of course, didn't have the vision to see snooker as something broadcasted to millions across the world. did higgins? not exactly. i dont think any of this was ever his plan. he was just a natural born entertainer come loon of a genius who catalysed all the things you described, an odd confluence of colour television becoming widespread, snooker being somewhat a colourful thing you could test that out with, and there being a 'gentlemanly' establishment that wouldn't offend viewers. bear in mind that when higgins packed out exhibitions there would be people outside, not seeing, just hearing what he was doing. i think that sort of shows people would have watched him in black and white. i'll go on a short foray because why not. i remember reading a strange old book by wyndham lewis called Tarr. most of it is incomprehensible, but one line 'passion precludes the idea of success' hit me. that was higgins exactly. sure he wanted to win, sure he'd want to make a century to thrill the crowd, but when you watch him you watch more for the creative process rather than a large break composed of shots 30 seconds in between the like of mark selby or yan bingtao would make. that isnt interesting at all, especially not to people who arent into snooker. but seeing higgins, he's just this mad twitching blob of conflicting emotions, he's so hot then cold. one moment he'll slam a red in at 100 mile an hour and next he'll play the loveliest, most subtle little canon in a kind of gung ho 'fuck you' way. unparalleled shot making, makes trump look simple. and the horrible old cloths they played on too. people say this guy wouldnt survive in the modern game, and its true in his later years he didnt survive in yesteryear's game. but thats not the point. its the passion be brought to something 90% of people would view as hopelessly mundane. higgins missed many an easy red but he could do things no one since or ever will can. always interesting to hear steve davis talk about ronnie o'sullivan, yes the word genius is occasionally thrown around. but steve, deep into a thought, would rather call o'sullivan 'amazing' or 'fantastic', and that's probably the right word. because he plays near damn perfectly. but thats not what genius is, is madness and the ability to cause seismic shifts in your particular genre, whether than be music, art, science or even snooker. its messy, unpalatable, and mad. you wouldnt want to live with it. judging by how higgins ended up it was probably more of a curse. whereas o'sullivan is alright these days. it just goes to show. i'd hate to be a genius, but i guess higgins had no choice
Higgins' technique certainly looked odd. The consensus is that at the time his cue tip hit the cue ball, EVERYTHING must have been lined up right. My theory is the extra millisecond or so he was moving on the shot gave THAT much more sidespin on the ball giving the results seen here and in other videos. This can be done when you're young, but for Higgins age and his lifestyle caught up with him. He did bloody well to last until his late 30s.
Today's 90 Template pockets would have prevented many of those pots going in, so although today's players are more accurate, the players from those days still had to play with some flair. Incase anyone doesn't know, in 1990, in a bid to help standardise championship tables, and improve the skill level required to play the tables in all the different tournaments, all professional championship tables had pockets cut with a much tighter template, with parallel sides, sharper corners, and narrow access middle pockets. Until the official championship template was introduced, some of the tables had pockets that could vary by up to 5 mm.
Interesting. What I'm curious of is the same thing with American pool where a few decades back the pockets were dimensionally bigger but the faces were more angled and of course overall those tables played dimensionally easier then the tighter pockets of today. But the tighter pockets of today, the faces of the pocket are more straight cut and not angled. What this means is that no matter what, the pockets are more accepting especially when shooting balls hard alongside the rails where back in the day the pockets being bigger but angled, even well struck shots if shot too firm would rattle in the pocket and that's what they were designed to do and the original dimensions from Brunswick which was even bigger but more angled were designed to do just that were if you cut balls down the rail even on the short side and dragged a little bit of rail coming in, at a slow speed, the ball is not going in the pocket like it would easily today. And that was the point because now your opponent would have an easy starter although deep in the jaws of the pocket. The other thing too because people were smart even 200 years ago where they had the mathematics of things figured out, and bigger pockets that are more angled hang the balls up in the pocket for certain shots that I described and even if struck hard they were apt to rattle the pocket and either stay there or very close and exhibiting it's own geometric brand of penalty, where are the tighter straight cut pockets of today if you jam one down a rail and it rattles for a lack of better term, it bounces off one face and then directly to the other face and oftentimes now heads directly for the adjacent corner pocket and some tables where the mechanic who set it up did not set it up dimensionally correct where the pocket faces don't line up geometrically with the opposite end corner pocket faces that should be a mirror image or geometry I should say of the other corner pocket and in some cases if you were to measure the angle of those faces as opposed to the opposite ones at the end of the table there can be as much as two degrees off and in some cases you got some pockets that are very funny and you jam it down a rail and it does its double face balance out of the pocket and directly into the adjacent corner pocket and that is pretty horrible when considering now a person gets rewarded for missing and in many cases if it doesn't go into the other corner pocket then it tends to bounce back and then stay at the middle of the rail either leaving the opponent hooked or a bank shot and something isn't right about that obviously because when you miss you're supposed to get penalized and not rewarded. But my question to you is because even back in the day when the pockets were dimensionally bigger just like what you're describing here in this video, in the American pool scene, people like to talk about how big the pockets were back then not realizing that pretty much any pool hall back then in the '60s and '70s had at least one house table or more that were tight and much more difficult then the tight pockets of today because the tide pockets of today utilize the rail rubber as the face of the pockets itself we're back in the day they added leather shims to make the pocket tighter and depending how on how hard the leather was or if it got hard over time, these tables played brutally tight and that's another thing people don't realize that those big names and pros were so good which is typical of a pro in any era in all reality that they handle those tables like a pro where some people argue that they'd like to see those old time players play on tight equipment not realizing that they played on title equipment sometimes when they gamble or whatever. The brings up 1981 like in this match here and yes the pockets are bigger and I'm sure there are people who probably think that guys like Alex Higgins and so forth would struggle on tight equipment and my question to you is just like pool did the snooker clubs have at least one or two tables that were dimensionally tight like they are today? Because even if they did, if anyone thinks that these guys here wouldn't be able to handle it, they are dead wrong. I came up with the saying but I'm not claiming it's revolutionary or anything but I do know for a fact that a good percentage of people no matter what the endeavor is whether it's snooker or golf or darts or whatever, they are always watching the best pretty much under the highest levels of competition not realizing how truly good they actually play. I found that out in 1989 watching a world champion named Nick varner in my local pool room and he came in twice a year for about a week each time and I saw him for two consecutive years when he was number one in the world and what I saw I did not think a person could consistently play like that and the second year I saw him playing his wife where he spots her the 357 and 9 and she can play normal and she gets all the breaks and she was a decent player but Nick can only kick or combinate or bank or carom but he cannot shoot a ball straight into a hole and here I am already demoralized thinking nobody could play that good consistently which was already on outer space levels but what I saw him do playing against his girlfriend I didn't even think was possible and there was no wild misses when considering he hits a cue ball into the side rail withdraw as hard as he breaks pretty much and the cue ball comes back and razor cuts off of the one and carams into an off angle billiard into the nine dead into the pocket.... I mean like the shot isn't even laying natural and the billiard required a very very thin hit coming back to the one that he slammed the cue ball into the rail first across the table and he was doing things like this over and over and over and there was no 70% other shots that he missed that I'm not mentioning... There was literally none of that. I mean it's like the guy would miss a three-rail bank like maybe once a day and when he did miss the balls like in the Jaws. And that's where I came up with the saying and I am sure it applies to guys like Alex Higgins and all these big names where: "Never doubt a world champion". I wouldn't know I live in America but I bet my life and I guarantee that Alex Higgins right there at 1981 for instance, if he walked into a local club you could get the best damn player in that area to play him for money and Alex is going to destroy him, and I would imagine somebody watching who knows his game from television would say I didn't know he could play that good. ..... Because there's no pressure playing the best local player in a club for a guy that plays on TV in front of the world against the best players. It wouldn't surprise me that Alex would have to concentrate just to get up and be interested in playing in that local club against the best player in the area.... But that's the point too, he's not going to fall asleep in those cases even if he's not interested because he wouldn't be a world champion if he had that kind of attitude. And I don't care if they got the tightest table in Ireland and put Alex on it in a club with no TV cameras and so on, he'd be handling it no problem I'm sure of that.
I've always said if any of the old guard grew up and played on today's table's they would of still been great player's. To me they could all play great snooker with talent.
Alex Higgins vs Fred Davis one of the few matches where maybe most folks were pulling for the other guy instead of Alex. Difficult not to love Fred Davis!
Yamaha are the greatest company in the world i think. how did they manage to sponsor this over the cigarette companys? 2 years before the release of the DX7 - what a time
Is this the tournament where Denis Taylor and John Pulman were commentating and a player equalled the highest break, the prize for which was a Yamaha organ? When Taylor said the prize would be shared, Pulman said, "But Denis, what can you do with half an organ?"
Some of these old tapes are gold dust.
It is a remarkable fact that the world champion of 1948 once played the world champion of 2022 in a professional tournament game.
In 1992 no less!
Talk about handing over the baton! 😆
@@JongleurJ10 Or even that the world finalist of 1940, the final edition before the Second World War, played the world champion of 2022, the first edition to be played in front of an audience in its entirety after the Covid pandemic...
@@danielkarmy4893 I suppose what we take from this is both players had/have long careers, with a very small overlap.
@nlgbbbblth yes this sounds best
Love any matches with Jimmy or Alex..
Thank you so much for the memorable uploads brother.
Love the fact that old Fred is still walking back to his seat whilst Alex is down on his shot. Two fantastic characters of this wonderful sport.
Knowing Fred he was walking back to Alex's seat. I loved the way he just left the rest on the table, didn't even think about putting it away himself, or even handing it to Len Ganley, proper old school.
A joy to see the Hurricane play. Such a quick snooker brain. Thanks for uploading.
He played with loads of side as tables were alot slower then also a great tactitian
Doesn't get much better than this. Dickie Davies, Higgins, Davis & the icing on top, Len "Crush Your Balls" Ganley.
It certainly was the Golden Age of Snooker...
Clive Everton and John Pulman in commentary as well.
And it's a blessing reading these comments from people like yourselves who love and appreciate these people and snooker memories!
Who’s the commentator?
@@christiandecamps1814 Clive Everton commentating and John Pullman adding the extra bits.
@@christiandecamps1814 One of them was John Pulman, 5 times World Champion.
ขอขอบคุณครับ ที่แบ่งปันสนุกเกอร์อดีต มาให้ได้ชมกันครับ
Very interesting footage, thanks for sharing this.
Fred was an absolute gentleman.
One of the greats
68 years old in this game.
First player to hit a century in the 1984 or 85 world championship, I think. Bit of an odd cue action too, but it worked for him. Class act.
Higgins was a draw brilliant to watch back in the day. Loved alex.
Even when he lied outright about hearing Cliff Thorburn nominate the green? Nasty character.
@@1977ajax There is no way that you can say that Higgins heard him say green. He wouldn't have been watching. He'd have been fiddling with his fag packet or his towel.
@@1977ajax Nobody heard him nominate FFS, not even the ref, so how in gods name would you expect Alex to hear🤦😂😂
@@pauldonohoe3646 I heard it, you heard it, Alex heard it.
@@1977ajax You didn't hear it, I didn't hear it, Alex didn't hear it and most of all, the referee didn't hear it. And do you know why the people mentioned didn't hear it? Because he didn't say it.
There used to be footage on YT of Fred compiling a big century break v a Kirk Stevens in a World Championship, cant find it any more so I shall enjoy this in its place.
It's still on here under century breakers (starts at 7.30 mark) ua-cam.com/video/YDkARz0YiVA/v-deo.html
That 80’s keyboard into put shivers up my spine!
Sprocket Shuffle by John Cameron. The full version is on youtube.
Love the opening music theme magic .... Two great players so miss Alex
Me too Freind 👍
Sprocket Shuffle by John Cameron. The full version is on youtube.
Amazing how with such grit and determination he makes it happen but it's not just that, he has a very complex and high level recollection database in his mind where each shot where he needs a particular effect in order to pocket the ball and play position, he has a high level grasp of what gaff to flick or jerk in with all that tension that he plays with and that's the most amazing part because he's turned what is very inconsistent into consistency because he just knows the deep feel for so many different alignments and body positions..... There's no way that sheer will and determination gets it done, there has to be a deep grasp of command and with his style there are so many different things to remember.... The concentration level in order to recollect that checklist where if he forgets one thing the shot is ruined.... It's quite incredible.
Have a look at Higgins 2 century breaks against terry griffiths in 1979 pure excitement. He was really buzzing☺ went on to lose 10-9 Alex lost loads of matches he should of won. Left me gutted many times when I was a kid. RIPALEX
@@markwilliams984Are they available to watch - I've not come across those.
RIP Dickie Davies 🙏
Those who compare the game then to the way it is now don't realise the impact the early TV snooker had on my generation. The modern standard may be stronger but for me the magic disappeared from the game a long time ago. Give me Reardon, Higgins, Fred & Cliff Wilson anyday!
The magic of Cliff Wilson😂 Don’t forget the wizardry of Perrie Mans who sadly never scored a single century in his career or the sorcery of Graham Miles who had that way of cueing where his cue was about 6 inches to the side of his chin. Those were the days.
Si brilliantly put.
Couldn't agree more, I stayed up late nights watching. Heard of hurricane Higgins before I knew about snooker.
The magic disappeared from your mind not from the game.
Dickie Davies,the face of sport
Great upload...rare stuff
Unique music went great with snooker .
Sprocket Shuffle by John Cameron. The full version is on youtube.
Alex is just pure genius. Never bettered.
Interesting what the commentator said about Higgins @4:42 It was almost exactly what Ray Reardon said about Higgins between sessions when he played him. Almost sounds like he had some "help" before the second sessions?
"At 15 all' the guy who left that table was a loser, but the guy who came out wasn't the guy who went in"
The World semi finalist of 1938 played the World quarter finalist of 2038
That's a span of 100 years. Remarkable!
Higgins, what a legend!!
Is that Len Ganley refereeing?
Sure is
Fabulous 😊
Cannn we all just appreciate that shot from yellow to green at 19:00 👌🏼 ... nananananer 19
Do you have the interview that Alex did after a match with Fred Davis ( I think it was at a uk championship) Alex and Fred held hands after Alex jokingly said to Fred “why don’t you lay down and die”…. Alex had great respect and admiration for Fred.
I'm afraid I don't. I've seen a lot of Higgins interview over the years but that one doesn't ring any bells.
Is there some sort of outbreak?? The amount of coughing is unreal!!
Covid
Everybody is smoking, including the players
Some rare Fred Davis footage 👍
Marvelous find. Alex at his peak, Fred's character coming out even though he only played about five shots and the irreplaceable Len Ganley refereeing, one of the few refs to have made century breaks. Oh, and Dickie Davies before his hair went weird. What's not to like?
Alex was at his peak in the early to mid 70s. He was on the slide by 1981 when Steve Davis raised the standard beyond him.
That double with the rest!
Yeah, try doing that with today's middle pockets. I guess it was still a good shot though.
Nice to see him smile after a misscue . not many do today
Not many players smile at all nowadays. Their faces are always tripping them.
@@MachineNightmare yeah it's not same now .
Great stuff!
Do you have footage of Alex v Tony Drago from the 1988 World Cup at all?
Ooh that sounds tasty.
man that intro. ive not heard that since I was about 6
Sprocket Shuffle by John Cameron. The full track is on youtube.
Fred was a legend even played Ronnie O Sullivan in one of his last qualifiers at 79
Fred took a frame off him too.
@@williambriggs79 defies logic playing top class snooker at that age
@MIKE RUSBY 3D sadly it was a qualifier so no footage but ROS speaks about playing him in his book
@MIKE RUSBY 3D that’s a good shout you never know someone might turn up something 👍
Fred should have tucked the cue ball tight behind the green.
Did you notice in the third frame, that Mr Davis sat on Alex’s chair.
Alex Higgins was an absolute gentleman.
I must've missed a lot of that.
Incidents involving disputing his rivals, complaining about referees, throwing knitted toys into the audience every time he lost a frame during his major exit in 1990...
He was well liked, and admonished, but calling him a gentleman is a bit of a stretch I think.
A gentleman and a scholar! 😂
Great to see a young Len Ganley refereeing.
The Derbly Assembly Rooms
Had to be the oddest looking trophy back in the day. Cracking match.
im trying to find a better photo of the trophy at 0:01 but i cant find it anywhere.
"looks like end of break - only a double will keep him going now" Alex liked a double
How the hell did Higgins play like that, it's like natural talent personified.That black at the end, when he whips it in with his whole body, and all the mad shots slammed in like it's nothing with tons of side and spin. This guy made the game, funny to think Fred Davis didn't want more pros in at the time. It's alright of him to sit there and smile like a benign old man but while he and his brother were custodians of the professional game and won about 30 world titles combined snooker was going nowhere, it took Higgins to make snooker popular
I was unaware that the historical record ever showed Fred complaining about the new group of professionals. Everything I've read/seen shows Fred being complimentary to the new players throughout the 1970s and 1980s. He was upset about changes made to billiards during the early 1980s revival but that wasn't directed at players.
I also don't think it's accurate to blame Joe or Fred for the decline of the sport in the 1960s. Fred retired after Snooker Plus didn't take off, the world title was defended on a dreary challenge basis that the public wasn't interested in, and exhibitions dried up. They didn't have a governing body or enough organization to have good national exposure.
All of snooker benefitted from the world title going back to the knockout format in 1969, the establishment of the WPBSA in 1971, and the emergence of Pot Black and color TV coverage. If we don't have all of those elements, we don't get to enjoy clips like these of The Hurricane in full flow. It's a shame the evolution didn't happen a little faster so we could see film of Higgins winning the world title in 1972.
Agree mate 100% Alex brought snooker to the masses. Most players will admit that. He was box office. RIP HURRICANE.
@@johnburris4212 Hi John I don't think it could have happened faster, or sooner. Yes all those things you describe may well have benefitted the snooker players, but most of those players could never have inspired the new generation, IMO that came from Higgins singlehandedly.
@@johnburris4212 it is described in documentaries about snooker history. i think their idea was, well, there's not much money in this game, what are we doing trying to spread it around more?
they of course, didn't have the vision to see snooker as something broadcasted to millions across the world. did higgins? not exactly. i dont think any of this was ever his plan. he was just a natural born entertainer come loon of a genius who catalysed all the things you described, an odd confluence of colour television becoming widespread, snooker being somewhat a colourful thing you could test that out with, and there being a 'gentlemanly' establishment that wouldn't offend viewers. bear in mind that when higgins packed out exhibitions there would be people outside, not seeing, just hearing what he was doing. i think that sort of shows people would have watched him in black and white.
i'll go on a short foray because why not. i remember reading a strange old book by wyndham lewis called Tarr. most of it is incomprehensible, but one line 'passion precludes the idea of success' hit me. that was higgins exactly. sure he wanted to win, sure he'd want to make a century to thrill the crowd, but when you watch him you watch more for the creative process rather than a large break composed of shots 30 seconds in between the like of mark selby or yan bingtao would make. that isnt interesting at all, especially not to people who arent into snooker. but seeing higgins, he's just this mad twitching blob of conflicting emotions, he's so hot then cold. one moment he'll slam a red in at 100 mile an hour and next he'll play the loveliest, most subtle little canon in a kind of gung ho 'fuck you' way. unparalleled shot making, makes trump look simple. and the horrible old cloths they played on too. people say this guy wouldnt survive in the modern game, and its true in his later years he didnt survive in yesteryear's game. but thats not the point. its the passion be brought to something 90% of people would view as hopelessly mundane. higgins missed many an easy red but he could do things no one since or ever will can. always interesting to hear steve davis talk about ronnie o'sullivan, yes the word genius is occasionally thrown around. but steve, deep into a thought, would rather call o'sullivan 'amazing' or 'fantastic', and that's probably the right word. because he plays near damn perfectly. but thats not what genius is, is madness and the ability to cause seismic shifts in your particular genre, whether than be music, art, science or even snooker. its messy, unpalatable, and mad. you wouldnt want to live with it. judging by how higgins ended up it was probably more of a curse. whereas o'sullivan is alright these days. it just goes to show. i'd hate to be a genius, but i guess higgins had no choice
Higgins' technique certainly looked odd. The consensus is that at the time his cue tip hit the cue ball, EVERYTHING must have been lined up right. My theory is the extra millisecond or so he was moving on the shot gave THAT much more sidespin on the ball giving the results seen here and in other videos.
This can be done when you're young, but for Higgins age and his lifestyle caught up with him. He did bloody well to last until his late 30s.
16:40 Fred risking his life by sitting in Alex's chair
Alex went on to head butt him 3 times after this match 👍
Great old player Fred Davis. Not slow at all. I hope Ronnie is still playing at that age.
That music tho, like an 80s comedy.
Saw Fred playing in our local snooker club last night. He's still got it
If he were still here he would be celebrating his 109th birthday in August.
@@nigelcolman2489 yes. He looked as if he was 108 so it was definitely him. His grandparents were looking on as he hustled anyone that dared play him
Must be 110 now
Hilarious
Today's 90 Template pockets would have prevented many of those pots going in, so although today's players are more accurate, the players from those days still had to play with some flair.
Incase anyone doesn't know, in 1990, in a bid to help standardise championship tables, and improve the skill level required to play the tables in all the different tournaments, all professional championship tables had pockets cut with a much tighter template, with parallel sides, sharper corners, and narrow access middle pockets.
Until the official championship template was introduced, some of the tables had pockets that could vary by up to 5 mm.
Interesting.
What I'm curious of is the same thing with American pool where a few decades back the pockets were dimensionally bigger but the faces were more angled and of course overall those tables played dimensionally easier then the tighter pockets of today.
But the tighter pockets of today, the faces of the pocket are more straight cut and not angled.
What this means is that no matter what, the pockets are more accepting especially when shooting balls hard alongside the rails where back in the day the pockets being bigger but angled, even well struck shots if shot too firm would rattle in the pocket and that's what they were designed to do and the original dimensions from Brunswick which was even bigger but more angled were designed to do just that were if you cut balls down the rail even on the short side and dragged a little bit of rail coming in, at a slow speed, the ball is not going in the pocket like it would easily today.
And that was the point because now your opponent would have an easy starter although deep in the jaws of the pocket.
The other thing too because people were smart even 200 years ago where they had the mathematics of things figured out, and bigger pockets that are more angled hang the balls up in the pocket for certain shots that I described and even if struck hard they were apt to rattle the pocket and either stay there or very close and exhibiting it's own geometric brand of penalty, where are the tighter straight cut pockets of today if you jam one down a rail and it rattles for a lack of better term, it bounces off one face and then directly to the other face and oftentimes now heads directly for the adjacent corner pocket and some tables where the mechanic who set it up did not set it up dimensionally correct where the pocket faces don't line up geometrically with the opposite end corner pocket faces that should be a mirror image or geometry I should say of the other corner pocket and in some cases if you were to measure the angle of those faces as opposed to the opposite ones at the end of the table there can be as much as two degrees off and in some cases you got some pockets that are very funny and you jam it down a rail and it does its double face balance out of the pocket and directly into the adjacent corner pocket and that is pretty horrible when considering now a person gets rewarded for missing and in many cases if it doesn't go into the other corner pocket then it tends to bounce back and then stay at the middle of the rail either leaving the opponent hooked or a bank shot and something isn't right about that obviously because when you miss you're supposed to get penalized and not rewarded.
But my question to you is because even back in the day when the pockets were dimensionally bigger just like what you're describing here in this video, in the American pool scene, people like to talk about how big the pockets were back then not realizing that pretty much any pool hall back then in the '60s and '70s had at least one house table or more that were tight and much more difficult then the tight pockets of today because the tide pockets of today utilize the rail rubber as the face of the pockets itself we're back in the day they added leather shims to make the pocket tighter and depending how on how hard the leather was or if it got hard over time, these tables played brutally tight and that's another thing people don't realize that those big names and pros were so good which is typical of a pro in any era in all reality that they handle those tables like a pro where some people argue that they'd like to see those old time players play on tight equipment not realizing that they played on title equipment sometimes when they gamble or whatever.
The brings up 1981 like in this match here and yes the pockets are bigger and I'm sure there are people who probably think that guys like Alex Higgins and so forth would struggle on tight equipment and my question to you is just like pool did the snooker clubs have at least one or two tables that were dimensionally tight like they are today?
Because even if they did, if anyone thinks that these guys here wouldn't be able to handle it, they are dead wrong.
I came up with the saying but I'm not claiming it's revolutionary or anything but I do know for a fact that a good percentage of people no matter what the endeavor is whether it's snooker or golf or darts or whatever, they are always watching the best pretty much under the highest levels of competition not realizing how truly good they actually play.
I found that out in 1989 watching a world champion named Nick varner in my local pool room and he came in twice a year for about a week each time and I saw him for two consecutive years when he was number one in the world and what I saw I did not think a person could consistently play like that and the second year I saw him playing his wife where he spots her the 357 and 9 and she can play normal and she gets all the breaks and she was a decent player but Nick can only kick or combinate or bank or carom but he cannot shoot a ball straight into a hole and here I am already demoralized thinking nobody could play that good consistently which was already on outer space levels but what I saw him do playing against his girlfriend I didn't even think was possible and there was no wild misses when considering he hits a cue ball into the side rail withdraw as hard as he breaks pretty much and the cue ball comes back and razor cuts off of the one and carams into an off angle billiard into the nine dead into the pocket.... I mean like the shot isn't even laying natural and the billiard required a very very thin hit coming back to the one that he slammed the cue ball into the rail first across the table and he was doing things like this over and over and over and there was no 70% other shots that he missed that I'm not mentioning... There was literally none of that.
I mean it's like the guy would miss a three-rail bank like maybe once a day and when he did miss the balls like in the Jaws.
And that's where I came up with the saying and I am sure it applies to guys like Alex Higgins and all these big names where:
"Never doubt a world champion".
I wouldn't know I live in America but I bet my life and I guarantee that Alex Higgins right there at 1981 for instance, if he walked into a local club you could get the best damn player in that area to play him for money and Alex is going to destroy him, and I would imagine somebody watching who knows his game from television would say I didn't know he could play that good.
..... Because there's no pressure playing the best local player in a club for a guy that plays on TV in front of the world against the best players. It wouldn't surprise me that Alex would have to concentrate just to get up and be interested in playing in that local club against the best player in the area.... But that's the point too, he's not going to fall asleep in those cases even if he's not interested because he wouldn't be a world champion if he had that kind of attitude.
And I don't care if they got the tightest table in Ireland and put Alex on it in a club with no TV cameras and so on, he'd be handling it no problem I'm sure of that.
I've always said if any of the old guard grew up and played on today's table's they would of still been great player's. To me they could all play great snooker with talent.
The balls slide in off the jaws now because there’s hardly any nap. It widens the angle. Makes potting down the cushions much easier.
Alex Higgins vs Fred Davis one of the few matches where maybe most folks were pulling for the other guy instead of Alex. Difficult not to love Fred Davis!
Covid was around then, judging by the audience.
Yamaha are the greatest company in the world i think. how did they manage to sponsor this over the cigarette companys?
2 years before the release of the DX7 - what a time
Well said .
Is this the tournament where Denis Taylor and John Pulman were commentating and a player equalled the highest break, the prize for which was a Yamaha organ? When Taylor said the prize would be shared, Pulman said, "But Denis, what can you do with half an organ?"
You know who _would've_ been a new Alex Higgins if he hadn't fkn it all up...?
Stephen Lee
There's only one Alex (the hurricane ) Higgins.
Cant see a player being competatable in their 60s in this day and age.
Davis would have been had he not retired
Jimmy White beat Judd Trump not long ago and he's in his 60's
Jees, whole audience sound like they're choking to death out there!?
Around 5:20, it sounds like a Tuberculosis ward with all the coughing. Jesus.
why do snooker audiences always sound like doctors waiting rooms.
bet theres no ray edmonds footage.
Ray Edmonds was a very underrated player with an excellent amateur record. Of course he became better known for commentary & billiards.
8:15 ridiculous stuff 😅
"..42,000 of the worlds very best billiard players from around the world.. ..for £10,000.........
fred seemed to miscue quite a bit, weird
Whole audience sound like they've got colds jeesus
A lot of emphysema back in '81.... 😷
Loads of ones coughing and constantly spluttering in the audience….
Corona virus must have been rampant then? The audience are coughing like mad!
Everyone smoked like crazy
Omg the amount of coughing -bloody cigarette cough glad smoking banned from areaa
Was Fred Steve’s Dad? 😂
Oh, great one!
@@RichardBridge-fw3tf thanks!
'thus applying the ncessary backspin to obtain that position'. jeez talk about an over explanation by Clive everton :/
TUNE
A lot of coughing happening isn’t it 😂😂 😷🤧🤢
THE HURRICANE.
Кто там кашляет, всё время? Ковид что ли??? :)))
Isnt that intro music just cringing! Sounds like the worst of Shakatak!