Jack proved too strong for K. Blundell of Paddock C & BC in the first round of the Huddersfield Snooker Championship, as reported here. There are no further reports until we find Jack in the semi final against the holder Harold Smith. It is four years ago since Jack was in a semi-final, five years since his last final and fifteen years since he last won the Snooker title. This shows us that he has concentrated on his billiards play more than his snooker, but is still able to raise his game occasionally. The old saying that ‘a good snooker player doesn’t always make a good billiards player, but a good billiards player is always a good snooker player’. The reasoning for this is that the billiards player has usually a better control of the cue ball with only the three balls on the table. The other semi-final is between Roy Fallan and Harold Burkinshaw, the reigning billiards champion, who is looking for a double at his first attempt in the snooker championship.
Jack won by 3 frames to 2 in a very close game where both players were willing to play attacking shots. Smith won the first frame and Jack levelled in the second, but when Jack missed a pink in the third Smith stepped in to lead 2-1. With Smith looking to be the more likely winner, the fourth frame was very even up to the colours, until Jack potted up from the green to take the match into a deciding frame. It was undoubtedly the best frame of the night as Jack dominated to take a 46 – 0 lead, but Smith didn’t give in and with a break of 32 followed by the blue he was back in the match. At this point it was anybody’s game but Jack, by good potting, took the vital balls to put himself in the final.
Jack’s old rival and Yorkshire League team mate Harold Burkinshaw won his semi-final by the same score line. The final did not reach any great heights with both players missing a number of easy shots – could it be because they are both better billiard players? The first frame went to Jack in what must have been the lowest scoring game ever played in a final, 39 – 21. Harold produced better form in the second frame to comfortably draw level. The third frame saw both players reluctant to attack and as a result the game was long and drawn out, but Jack gained the upper hand to win and put himself in a favourable position. The fourth frame saw Jack play his best of the night to win comfortably, taking home the Championship for the fifth and final time for him.
This is the first year that there has been a mention of Paddock Institute and Conservative Club. For those that don’t know or can’t remember, Paddock Conservative Club was on Brow Road, and the Institute Club was on Raven Street and had a bowling green. For some reason, perhaps lack of members, the Conservative Club ceased to exist and was taken over by the West Indian community and turned into the Arawack Club. I assume that after discussion, the two clubs merged – again perhaps because of a lack of members at the Institute Club – and became what it is now the Institute and Conservative Club. Being involved in veteran snooker and crown green bowling myself, I know that it is quite often referred to as the Con Club rather than Institute and Con Club.
Paddock Institute and Conservative Club entered the Yorkshire Team Snooker Knock-Out competition this year, along with Lindley Lib and Lindley WMC. As we can see by the reports, there was a lot of interest in this competition. There are no specific game results just the team result, as Paddock and Lindley Lib. win their first round games, and Lindley WMC lose to Ackroyd Street WMC. The second round saw Paddock and Lindley drawn against each other. I haven’t got any match reports but we can see by the semi-final draw that Lindley won. In the first home leg of the match, Lindley lost 4 frames to 2, meaning they had to win 5 of the possible 7 frames to be played in the away leg. I do not have any result from the away leg but it would be a surprising if Lindley won through.
Despite the apparent merger of the Con. & Inst. the paper reports that Non-Political Billiards League Champions, Paddock Conservative Club, won their first game with Jack in fine form making breaks of 82 and 72. This could mean that the Con. club was still running before it’s merger with the Institute, or that the Con. players are still playing under their old name but running from the Institute – we may never know. As we can see, the Paddock Con. billiards team are not reaching the heights of their previous year.
The early pace setters of section ‘A’ of the Non-Political Snooker League, were Thornton Lodge and Hillhouse & Birkby. Paddock Con. ‘A’ eventually pulled themselves up the league and with one game left were in a battle for the title. They are 1 point behind Primrose Hill, who have 1 game to play but Paddock have 2 games left. Unfortunately I do not know the outcome of these last matches and who qualified for the knock-out stages of the league, but neither teams made it through to the semi-finals and Milnsbridge County were the eventual winners.
Jack Mellor 