Getting better at pool: from potting to position

There is the game of making this ball go in that pocket, and there is the game of arriving at the next shot with an angle you want. Beginners play the first exclusively, and they are right to — a shot you cannot pot is not improved by planning what happens afterwards. But the ceiling of the first game is low, and it is reached surprisingly fast.

The second game is what separates a competent club player from somebody who has been playing in pubs for twenty years, and the gap between them is much larger than the pot success rate suggests. A player who clears a table is usually not potting harder shots; they are potting easier ones, because each shot was left for them by the previous one.

The uncomfortable implication is that the mark of improvement is the shots getting easier rather than the player getting better at hard ones, which is the opposite of how progress feels in most games.

What beginners train

Potting

What decides frames

Where the cue ball stops

Most overrated skill

Side spin

Most underrated skill

Choosing which ball to leave

1. 1

   Step 1: A repeatable stance and a straight cue action

   Everything else is built on this and it is the least interesting item on the list. A cue that does not travel straight produces unintended side spin on every shot, which makes the cue ball behave unpredictably and makes all subsequent learning impossible to interpret.

   You will know it worked when: The same shot twice in a row.

2. 2

   Step 2: Stopping the cue ball where you intend

   Stun, follow and draw — striking the cue ball centrally, above centre, and below centre. This is the entire vocabulary of position play and it is three things, not thirty. Learn what each does at various distances before adding anything.

   You will know it worked when: Predictable cue ball behaviour after the pot.

3. 3

   Step 3: Thinking one ball ahead, then two

   Before every shot, name where you want the cue ball to finish. Doing this even without succeeding changes the practice from potting to position, because it produces feedback where there was none.

   You will know it worked when: Every shot has a stated intention.

4. 4

   Step 4: Choosing the order of the balls

   Table planning: which of your balls are difficult, which are tied up, and which one has to be dealt with while you still have a choice. Most frames are lost at the start by clearing the easy balls first and leaving three hard ones.

   You will know it worked when: A plan before the first shot rather than after the third.

5. 5

   Step 5: Safety play

   The half of the game that pub players never practise. Playing deliberately to leave an opponent with nothing is often worth more than a low-percentage pot, and knowing when is a large part of match play.

   You will know it worked when: A viable option when there is no good shot.

6. 6

   Step 6: Side spin, last

   Useful, unavoidable at a high level, and the thing beginners reach for first. It changes the contact point on the object ball and it changes how the cue ball comes off a cushion, which means it introduces two new errors while solving one problem. It belongs after the centre-ball game is reliable.

   You will know it worked when: A tool used deliberately rather than habitually.

Playing frames is enjoyable and it is inefficient practice, because the shots that come up are unrepeatable, the feedback is delayed, and the outcome is confounded by the opponent. Solo practice on a table for half an hour is worth several evenings of frames, and it is the single clearest difference between people who improve and people who play a lot.

Drills that do the most:

• The line-up — All the balls in a line down the spots, and clear them in order. It rewards position and punishes it immediately, and it produces a score you can compare with last week.
• Stop shot at increasing distances — Pot a ball and stop the cue ball dead, from progressively further away. Teaches the relationship between pace and strike height better than any explanation of it.
• The same shot ten times — Repetition is what pub play never provides. Ten attempts at one awkward angle tells you whether you can play it; one attempt in a frame tells you nothing.
• Cue ball only, no object ball — Send the cue ball around the table to finish in a nominated area. Removes potting entirely and trains the thing that is actually limiting you.
• Play the ghost — Break, and try to clear the table; any miss is a loss. A structured way to make solo practice competitive, and it produces an honest record of how often you actually clear.