(Entertainment-NewsWire.com, May 07, 2015 ) London, UK -- If you are not a fan of snooker you may think it’s just a load of ….well, rubbish. But what started as a game widely believed to have been invented in India by British army officers in the nineteenth century now has a growing following of fans.
The final of the World Championship held in Sheffield over the past weekend attracted 4.5m television viewers to BBC2. With total prize money of about £1.3m and the bookies only giving the 38 year old winner, Stuart Bingham, odds of 50-1 it was nail-biting stuff. Throughout the tournament in 2014 more than 17m viewers tuned in.
Considering this sport fell into decline during the 1950s and 1960s it sprang back to life when colour TV became widely available (- can you imagine trying to keep track of up to 22 coloured balls with varying values when they all appeared to be just shades of grey?). And interest has spread to a global level. In China in particular it is claimed that there are some 60 million regular players, and in Shanghai alone the number of clubs has gone from 200 in 2008 to 1,500 now.
For the uninitiated, players score points by projecting the coloured balls into pockets situated around the edge of the table. Experienced players will try to make this more difficult for their opponents by positioning some of the balls to obscure access to the pockets. This is known as a “snooker” – which is where the game gets its name.
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