The stock of English Billiards went enormously high on Saturday. When A .l. Driffield the English Billiards champion defeated W. Ramage – the Scottish leader in the game by 1712 to 812 points in the world Amateur Billiards Championship.
The match on the second day was expected to provide a typical international match but popular expectations were not realized. Driffield proved to be much the better exponent of the game as his margin of victory – 900 points would also corroborate.
From the very start it looked abundantly clear that Driffield – the master in top-table play would carry everything before him and actually it happened.
Driffield led by 649 to 312 at the end of the first session. His breaks in the opening session above the fifty mark were 108 ,128,62,105 and 249. But inspite of his four three figure breaks Driffield appeared to be a bit slow scorer ,the scores in the session average 46.2 per visit. But nevertheless he was very consistent.
The English champion blended top – of – the – table play with losing hazard play exceedingly well to compile his big breaks. Walter Ramage who finished fourth in the championship last year was never anything like himself on Saturday’s match and mostly failed in his slow hazard play. Driffield’s best of the night was 249 which took him 19 minutes to make. Ramage’s best break in the first session was 71 through losing hazard play. His two other notable breaks were 66 and 64 .
The second session
With 75 in hand Driffield opened the second session with promise completing as he did just a century. Driffield was definitely unlucky in just missing two centuries which 98 and 97 would bear out. But he was not be damped. The English champion had two more century breaks 114 and 175. Ramage’s breaks of note in the closing season were 77, 93 and 90 . With a little luck the Scottish leader might have had at least one century break but that was not to be. The rate of scoring in the second session averaged 37.5 and the scoring of the whole match averaged 42.8 points per visit. Driffield showed falseworthy craftsmanship specially in the top – table play. His matches against Wilson Jones and C. Hirjee are expected to be well worth following.
Sunday’s Billiards
C. Hirjee ( India ‘B’) vs. A. Yunoos (Burma) – 5-30 and 8-30 p.m.