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King v Hawk question

Postby eraserhead

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So King needs two snookers on the pink to be able to win and one on the black to force a re-spot.

Asked in the final thread but wanted to get confirmation from someone who knows the rules in and out because situations like this don't happen often. Is there anyway Barry could do a tactical foul to avoid the shot he has to play, for example a miscue where the cue ball doesn't reach the pink. Or would after committing the foul Mark would be able to put Barry back in and he'd be faced with the same shot but Mark only needing one snooker now.

Re: King v Hawk question

Postby acesinc

eraserhead wrote:Image

So King needs two snookers on the pink to be able to win and one on the black to force a re-spot.

Asked in the final thread but wanted to get confirmation from someone who knows the rules in and out because situations like this don't happen often. Is there anyway Barry could do a tactical foul to avoid the shot he has to play, for example a miscue where the cue ball doesn't reach the pink. Or would after committing the foul Mark would be able to put Barry back in and he'd be faced with the same shot but Mark only needing one snooker now.



An older post but I just spotted this Rules question....

Part of the "Miss" rule that is misunderstood is that a referee always reserves the right to call a "miss" for ANY stroke, no matter what the scores are if he believes that the striker did not make a good faith effort to play a legal stroke. As the rule is written and as most people understand, a "miss" will not be called when the scores are such that either of the players cannot win the frame by acquiring all possible points currently on the table (generally called the "snookers required" stage.....I always thought that is poor nomenclature as a "snooker" does not translate in points; instead, I believe this should be more properly termed the "penalties required" stage). But if the referee has reason to believe that a player chose a shot to purposely commit a penalty (a "tactical foul" as you call it), then the ref can and should call it a Foul and a Miss as any other.

So my assumption is that you are thinking Hawkins could try one of two things:

1) roll very, very close to Pink, say within a couple inches. That would be one penalty, but now at least, he could just roll to Pink dead weight from so close and not knock Black in and hopefully NOT leave White touching Pink. He obviously risks hitting it too hard and knocking Black in anyway. If he does get close, say an inch or two, then the Ref probably won't call the intentional Miss, but maybe Mark King could just choose to do the dead weight roll up that Hawkins wanted to do. If he tactically Misses way too short, like a foot away, the Ref will probably call it an intentional Miss and even if he doesn't a dead weight roll up from a foot away is not an easy shot.

2) Tactically miss wide by rolling White all the way to the right side cushion as we view it. That would put White in position to strike Pink safely (the same kind of angle he was trying for with the cushion first shot). The ref almost certainly would have called this as an intentional Miss no matter what, miscue or no. Also, it would give King a free ball which he could use to jam the White into that niche between the Black and the opposite jaw if he felt comfortable enough to do that.

All in all, Barry Hawkins had very few choices. The Rules of Snooker are pretty well written to avoid allowing players the luxury of tactical fouls. When I saw his predicament, my first thought was to play exactly the shot that he attempted. But then after I looked at it for a bit, I think I would have changed my mind and tried going another direction....long way, off baulk cushion, side cushion, try to nuzzle up to Pink without hitting Black first. Still nearly impossible to pull off but at least he would have been approaching from a better angle, seeing a lot more Pink ball than he did in trying to control his spin off the side cushion only.

Re: King v Hawk question

Postby eraserhead

Thank you for that excellent write up! :hatoff: