Once upon a time, snooker was a macho indulgence.
Veering with all the swerve of a Massey (a shot named so after trick-shot specialist Mike Massey), the game swung between a gentleman’s club past-time and the backroom hustle of the downtown snooker parlour.
At one end of the table there was the lush, carpeted interior with deep oakwood panelling, where men, the kind who even wore suits on weekends, congregated to drink brandy, smoke cigars and pot a few reds.
At the other end of the table, there was a smoky haze wafting over the smell of cheap booze and stale snacks. Here, men (and sometimes women) staggered to the table, seemingly under the influence, and then, when the bait was bit, potted an impossible black straight into the heart of the pocket. And then, they collected the bet on the way to the bar.
Somewhere in between these two extremes is the current state of snooker as a sport. Since professional sportsmen cannot be seen as indulgent wastrels or drunken hustlers (though some do try), the sport has moved to that middle ground – where TV rights and sponsorship are the lifeblood, and agents make a lot of money.
Take for example current World No 1, Ronnie ‘The Rocket’ O’Sullivan. He ran a half marathon on the morning of one of his Premiership matches recently. Contrast that with ‘Big’ Bill Werbeniuk , once World No 8 and several times World Championship quarter finalist in the 1980s. He couldn’t start a match unless he had six pints of lager in him to steady his hand.
In today’s game a pint (or a smoke) wouldn’t be allowed within a mile of a professional match. But Big Bill played in an era when smoking and drinking did not yet fall under the purview of political correctness.
It was a time when snooker was less sedate and more character-filled. It was a time when Alex ‘the hurricane’ Higgins played. And in the rather modest universe of snooker, that was a unique and special time.
One rarely started playing snooker because one wanted to be Steve ‘the nugget’ Davis. Sure, you wanted to pot like Davis, but you wanted to ‘be’ Alex Higgins.
A snooker table is surrounded by two things – nicknames (as you might have guessed) and old men with stories.
And even in the one-table club of a smallish city in western India where I learnt the game, the stories were mostly about ‘the Hurricane’.
I don’t know if Alex Higgins ever played in India or even visited the country, but his influence was such that if you played the game, you knew his name.
Higgins had the kind of life that was hardly exemplary. In fact, it was reputations like his that had mothers and girlfriends worried when a young man began chalking his cue.
What Higgins gave snooker was a legacy of fallen genius; that legend around which it was possible to accept that greatness in sport did not automatically mean greatness in life. But, to take to an arena and be a World Champion was to leave an indelible mark, however flawed, on a sport forever.
Higgins made snooker glamourous and sexy and he did it by being World Champion. Twice.
This is not in any way to celebrate the debauchery that the likes of Higgins or Big Bill or even Jimmy ‘the whirlwind of London’ White attached to their lives, and thereby to the game of snooker.
On the contrary, one only has to look at a picture of Higgins before he died and then of him in his heyday, to understand the cost of a life not lived in moderation.
Every sport has its true greats. The ones beyond debate, doubt and discussion. The ones who are forever.
Football has Pele and Maradona. Tennis has Borg and Sampras. Boxing has Ali and Tyson. Cricket has Bradman and Lara.
Snooker has Steve Davis and Stephen Hendry. But before them, there was Alex Higgins.
Higgins died last month after a long battle with throat cancer. The last of snooker’s jet set.
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