Dusting down the baize

Gibraltar Seniors at EBA World Championship 2018, Bridlington, photo courtesy Shaun Rumbado


It's been a while since I've posted on this blog. And since I've played pool well.

2017 was a washout - too much on my mind to focus. And 2018 was an unmitigated disaster as far as playing any really decent frames were concerned. I tottered through two European Championships, one Nations Cup and one World Cup and emerged mostly feeling let down by my own relatively poor standard of playing. In fact, last week was the first time I played a proper match for months - I had toyed with the idea of simply giving up, but I enjoy the game too much!

Age hurts - along with my fifties have come all those niggling little ailments, and those aches and pains: the joints creak almost audibly, especially during late matches, and the old lumbar twinges as I stand . And the eyes! Good grief, I used to have superb eyesight until what seems like only a few months ago. Now I bend to the table and nothing is quite as razor sharp any more. A trip to the opticians is lined up for me next week!

Really having to think about it - EBA Nations Cup, 2017, Malta


After what was a tough World Cup Championship at  Bridlington for  me last November, I propped my pool cue in a corner of my room and left it there to mourn my loss of enthusiasm. Then what was going to be a Christmas break extended the length of January. I missed out league games, I avoided competitive play as much as I could, playing in only one tournament during a twelve week period, and I even managed to buck out of one of the rankings - the qualifiers for next year's international squad.

With the EBA European Championships 2019 coming up in May it is beginning to feel like 'now or never'. Can I come back from the edge of the abyss? Let me qualify that: the abyss is what the world without pool and my wonderful 'pool family' feels like. It has been two years of hassle, stress and ill health, especially the latter. Not always my own ill health but when a serious illness affects a close member of your family, it can knock you sideways, shake you up and make you stumble on your path.


In action at the EBA Nations Cup 2017, Malta


So, a mental shake up later and I'm ready to dust down the baize and get back into playing. Is it too late to do myself justice in Bridlington in May? Probably. But last week I played a doubles competition; played a mediocre game but we won, perhaps thanks to the efforts of my doubles, Charlie Bear. Then a singles competition where I was lucky my opponent didn't quite make the standard he can usually reach and I also won that. The spark has been reignited. If the fire isn't quite roaring yet, it's ok - all fires start with just a spark and a bit of kindling.

The plan? A bit of being kind to myself, keeping friends and family close and just enjoying the sheer fun of the sport. And practise, lots and lots of practice. Especially the cue action - I really have to work on that. It's exciting and I find myself looking forward to every game now.

Daunted by the hill climb to full strength ahead of me? A bit. But I shall head for the Europeans re-enthused, with many more hours of pool notched up on my belt...and probably a pair of specs!

At the IPA tournament, 2016, Gibraltar and a great photo by Tommy Finlayson!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On the starting blocks

Image
Photo: "Pool Game" by Serge Bertasius Photography from www.freedigitalphotos.net   Thirty-five years is a long time.  Too long for keeping up with skills learnt in my mid-teens.  Still, I loved the sport and in the depths of the stress of family life and work, home and finance and all that modern, rat-race stuff, I needed to get back to something I loved doing. At the age of 14 or 15, a friend of mine invited me up to the local snooker hall where I lived in Medway.  It was the snooker hall upstairs from Burtons on Gillingham High Street - not the most salubrious place in town - but the place where I was introduced to a sport I was to grow to love.  For a fairly quiet lad, it was a bit of a venture out to me, but I quickly warmed to the place and found that snooker came easily.  That's not a boast, being good at snooker was very tough, but I got the hang of the game pretty quickly, and pretty quickly I was beating my mates.  I had the ability to control the cue and
Read more

Taking a 'Break'

Image
A different kind of pool! Image by  Pexels  from  Pixabay Yes, I am having a break this summer. Not so much a summer holiday - just a couple of weeks off towards the end of August to chill by the sea is planned - but a break from pool. That does not mean I'm not playing pool, it means I'm taking a break from intense practicing, or playing in tournaments. The only pool I'm playing at the moment are the ranking series of matches twice a month. And that is enough for me during the summer. Come September, I'll be stepping up the preparation for the competitive league tournaments, cup tournaments, and, of course, the EBA Nations Cup in Cyprus in November. I do wonder if I might come in for some criticism by not being at the table as frequently as I can, practicing shot after shot, and sometimes I confess to feeling a bit guilty that I'm not. But the way I see it, you don't have basketball players running around the courts all day every day, or football playe
Read more

Playing pool at the Europeans: Bridlington 2019

Image
Gibraltar Seniors Team at EBA European Pool Championship 2018, Bridlington It's been a mad hectic couple of weeks travelling, playing pool, then trying to settle down to normality afterwards. There's always a build up to an international tournament. Besides being caught up with league matches, the GibOil Cup and Plate tournaments coming to a head and trying to fit in extra practice, there's the tension and the anticipation at playing some of the world's best players. The chill, the grey skies and cold rain of the Yorkshire coast did not dampen our spirits as the Gibraltar team headed for the venue that first morning. We had left behind blue skies, temperatures well into the twenties and a city making its first moves to the annual beach season, but we shrugged off the chill of a typical British spring morning and strode into the opening ceremony heads held high, proud to be waving the Gibraltar flag. The excitement ran through all the players like a current o
Read more