World Billiards Championship (English billiards)
The World Billiards Championship is an international cue sports tournament in the discipline of English billiards, organised by World Billiards, a subsidiary of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association. In its various forms, and usually as a single World Billiards Championship, the title is one of the oldest sporting world championships, having been contested since 1870.
From 2012 to 2014 there were separate timed and points divisions, with the tournament held in association with the International Billiards and Snooker Federation. In those years, there was no separate IBSF World Billiards Championship.
The rules adopted by the Billiards Association in 1899 are essentially the rules still used today. The tournaments have been played on a regular annual schedule since 1980, when it became administered by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association. The event was known as the World Professional Billiards Championship until 2010, and has had other names in the past, e.g. Billiards Championship of the World. In addition, the World Ladies Billiards Championship has been played since 1931 and organized by World Ladies Billiards and Snooker since 1998.
History
In the early 19th century, there was no recognised governing body or formal championship for English billiards. Jack Carr and Edwin Kentfield were prominent players when Carr challenged Kentfield to a championship game in 1825. Carr died on the eve of the match, and Kentfield hence assumed the title. He would remain unchallenged for 24 years.John Roberts Sr., who had spent years touring playing billiards and establishing his reputation as a player, challenged Kentfield. There was much controversy over the table and the pockets to be used, and Kentfield declined to play, so Roberts styled himself as champion, a title he held unchallenged until 1870, when he lost to William Cook.
William Cook, beat Roberts's son John Roberts, Jr. in a in 1869, and challenged Roberts Sr. for the title. Due to this being the first actual match for the World Championship, the players themselves drew up a special set of rules for the game. Roberts managed to get the pocket width reduced to 3–inches, and and were adjusted so that Cook's spot stroke strength, derived from his proficiency at consecutively the from its was weakened. Cook was nonetheless considered the favourite, and the 20-year-old had improved much from his win over Roberts Jr. the previous year. At 1:38 a.m. on the morning of 12 February 1870, Cook defeated Roberts to win the title, and won a newly created trophy, £100 and a Maltese cross. The Prince of Wales even attended the match at St. James's Hall. This match ended the dominance of Roberts Sr., as the wave of new players took over the game.
That initiated the World Championship, and it led to many challenges for the title. Roberts Jr. and Cook were the dominant players of the era. There were occasional uncontested matches. The rule said that a player had to accept a challenge within two months of it being issued. If it were ignored, the challenger became World Champion.
There was still the issue of the rules however. Many players preferred the "spot-barred" style with restrictions on the number of consecutive pots of the red allowed, but some preferred the "all-in" rules that did not contain such a restriction. Repeated potting of the red was a great strength for William Peall in particular.
There were three all-in competitions held separately from the title that Roberts held. Roberts was never challenged for that title. Billy Mitchell and Peall excelled in the late 1880s.
Billiards Association and Control Council
In 1892, the Billiards Association, was formed in February 1885, and produced a new set of rules in September 1885. They sanctioned two championships, a spot-barred and an all-in. Roberts ignored the competition, but the tournaments went ahead regardless. The "championship table" that Roberts Sr. had created was abandoned, and the normal table was instead used. Peall held the all-in title unchallenged, whereas Mitchell dominated spot-barred.In 1899, after 5 years without challenges, the Billiards Association changed the rules of the game. After two spot strokes, the red would be replaced on the centre spot, to limit the repetition of "all-in" play. Peall accepted this, although at the detriment of his personal fortunes, voting for the introduction of the new rule. This collectively gave rise to the modern version of English billiards, still played today.
Until 1910, there were many challenges, but in 1911, the competition was altered so that it became an annual tournament, to cope with the influx of new professionals.
In 1934, the tournament was won by Walter Lindrum, and the championship then collapsed. There were two matches held for the title in a span of decades, in 1951 and 1964.
In 1968, Rex Williams was on a trip to Australia, and decided to travel to Auckland to play the reigning champion Clark McConachy for the billiards title, the first contest since McConachy's 1951 win. By this time, McConachy was 73, and his play was affected by his Parkinson's disease. In a poor quality match, Williams won the title.
WPBSA title
, a member of the BA&CC Council was present at a meeting where the Council nominated him as the challenger to Rex Williams for the professional Billiards Championship. Williams declined to play Driffield within the five months time limit that the BA&CC Council had set, which expired on 7 July 1970, and forfeited the title, which was then contested between Driffield and Jack Karnehm in June 1971. On 1 October 1970, the Professional Billiard Players Association, which had been reestablished in 1968 Williams and seven other players, disaffiliated from the BA&CC. The Professional Billiard Players Association changed its name to the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association on 12 December 1970, and declared itself the governing body for the professional game, recognising Williams as champion. Driffield and Karnehm were, at first, the only two professionals to recognise the BA&CC as continuing to have authority over the game.In the 1970s, there were further challenge matches for the title. Rex Williams was dominant in this period. In 1980, Fred Davis won at the age of 67 to become World Champion. Since the 1980s, the world championship has sometimes been contested as a series of shorter games, for ecample in 150-up, the first player to win a designated number of games of first-to-150 is the victor.
From 1989 to 2011, Mike Russell was the dominant player, closely followed by Geet Sethi who won five titles. Some Australian players were successful in the 1980s, most notably Robby Foldvari and Eddie Charlton.
In 2011 WPBSA formed World Billiards to administer the sport worldwide. As of 2012, the distinction between professional and amateur players was removed and the WPBSA World Professional Championship was merged with the former IBSF World Billiards Championship and simply became the World Billiards Championship. Tournaments were held in both points and timed format. In 2015, the IBSF withdrew from World Billiards Limited and reinstituted its own championship.
David Causier, Pankaj Advani, and Peter Gilchrist are other multiple title winners in the modern game.
World Championship results
Main sources: English Amateur Billiards Association,A History of Billiards, Cue Sports India
Initial, self-declared World Champions
Challenge World Championships
Additional Source: Billiards by Joseph BennettAs there was no governing body in place, the rules were agreed between players, with representatives of The Sportsman newspaper providing arbitration if required.