My Greatest Trouncing
By RISO LEVI
Early in May, 1914, I had occasion to run down from London to Brighton on business. When I arrived there I found that I should be unable to return to town until the following afternoon. It was very cold for the time of the year, and, as it was a wet evening, I made up my mind, at 8 o’clock, to go into the billiards-room of my hotel for a couple of hours before going to bed.
There are any number of first-class hotels, throughout the country, the billiards-rooms of which are, particularly as regards the tables and their appurtenances, very far indeed from first-class. Consequently I had not the slightest expectation that evening of finding a table superior in any respect to those usually found in hotels at seaside resorts. My surprise and delight when I entered the room and looked at the table were therefore very great. There was no need to examine the nameplate to discover whose make it was. A single glance at the wide railwork and the broad sharp-nosed cushions was sufficient to tell me that it was a Burroughes & Watts table, and an exact counterpart of my own at home. In addition to this, the cloth was a silky, superfine one of a quality very rarely met with on public tables. Everything was in the very best condition; the table, as I learnt from the marker afterwards, had been put up only three days previously.
Naturally, I congratulated myself on my good fortune in having found such a table, and I looked forward to having a game on it. But the men who played that evening, were amongst the poorest I have ever watched, and the tight pockets—the table was a standard—did not help them at all. In addition to this the players, in each game, were friends who had come into the room together for a hundred up, and, therefore, my chance of a game was more remote still. The different games which I watched averaged about three-quarters of an hour each, and when the last one commenced at about ten past ten I made up my mind to have one more cigarette and then go to bed. I took one out of my case and struck a match, and as I did so a young man—he was almost a boy notwithstanding that he was tall and well – built — entered the room, came over, and sat down by my side. A minute or two later he asked me whether I would care to have a game when the table was at liberty.
As I had waited so long for one I decided that I might as well wait a little longer, and as there was no need for me to be up very early the next morning I replied that I should be very glad to play him.
The clock was striking eleven when the game we had bean watching came to an end, and in less than a minute we had the room to ourselves. Before we began, and whilst the marker was brushing the table for us, I said to my opponent:
“I don’t know what sort of game you play, but mine is rather above the average. I never care to have any advantage, and so I prefer that we pay half each. The table is a beautiful one and I should very much like to play 500 or 750 up, if it is not too late for you.”
“Thanks very much for offering to divide the table with me,” he replied, ” for I was just going to propose the very same thing to you. My game is also very considerably above the average. Indeed, as the table is just the make I am used to, and is in such perfect condition, I feel certain I shall be able to play well on it, and unless you are an exceptionally fine player I believe I shall beat you.”
The words, taken by themselves, may sound somewhere near the limit of boasting, for no matter how good a player may be there is always the possibility that one’s chance opponent may be still better. They were, however, uttered without a trace of brag, and with an obvious simplicity and truth I could not but admire. I could see clearly that he did not want to take me at a disadvantage, and wished to be open and frank with me in order that I might fully realize, before we began, that I was about to play no easily-defeated bungler. He had coloured up slightly as he spoke, perhaps because he was afraid lest his words led me to take him for a braggart. I knew very well that he had made no idle boast, and I therefore anticipated a display of very fine billiards. Nevertheless, I made up my mind to battle desperately for victory. If the table was exactly to my opponent’s liking, was it not entirely to mine also? And if, as I now apprehended, my opponent played a better game than I, this, so far from dismaying me, promised exactly the hard stern fight which always acts as a stimulant to me and not infrequently brings out my best form.
The marker told us that he did not mind how late we stayed, and therefore we decided to make the game 750. I estimated that we would finish by 1-30 at the latest. But that 750 up was the quickest game of its length wherein I have ever taken part. It still wanted a minute or two to half-past twelve when my opponent made the winning stroke. I had played quite a good game, as, in addition to a break of 94, I made two over seventy, and a couple of fifties, yet I was beaten by close on 400! From the very beginning, however, I saw that it was not just a question of his being somewhat better than I. I quickly realized that I was completely outclassed, and the three-figure breaks which he made, viz.: 105, 170, and 211—great as such a performance in a game of 750 up must always be—cannot by themselves convey to anyone an idea of the finished and truly professional kind of game this boy opponent of mine was capable of.
When the game was over we sat down for a final cigarette, and, after complimenting him on his wonderful display, I asked my companion whether he would mind letting me know what was his record break.
“I am afraid,” replied he, “that if I told you, you would think that I was telling you a fairy tale.”
“Not at all; I feel that I can believe implicitly whatever you tell me. And after what I have seen of your play during the last hour or so I should imagine that you must have made a break of 500, if not one of 600.”
“No,” he replied quietly, “I have never reached 500 yet, but a few weeks ago, at home, I attained my record of 491.”
“How is it that you have not entered for the Amateur Championship?”
“I have been very anxious to do so, but, although my pater is very desirous that I win it some day, he told me that he would not allow me to enter until I was 21, or until I had made a 500 break on a standard table. But now that I have got so near to this figure I am to enter for the next competition.
“Well, I wish you the best of luck,” I replied, “and if I happen to be in town at the time I shall certainly go and see you play.”
And then in answer to some further questions he gave me his billiards history. His father had been a very good amateur, and could still make an occasional century break. He had given him his first lessons, before he was quite six, on a little table in the nursery. When he was nine this table had been exchanged for a larger one, and when he was eleven he was so tall for his age that he was allowed to play on his father’s table. He made his first hundred on it within one month.
The war began just three months later, and this great player enlisted at once to do his bit. And before the year was over he had made the Supreme Sacrifice.
To the everlasting credit of our race, hundreds of thousands of our brave boys and men immediately answered Britain’s cry, when in her hour of need she called on her sons to take up arms for her, and this handsome upstanding young fellow was just one of the thousands of heroes who in the very early days of the fighting gave up their young lives for the country they loved so well. But when I learnt that my billiards opponent had fallen on the field of honour, I realised that we had lost a man who in a few years would undoubtedly have become the finest amateur exponent of billiards we have ever had, if he was not already that on the night on which I played him that memorable 750 up.
The Burwat billiards view. August 1930