8-ball tactic scenario

[mjantti]

Here's a situation I faced in European Champs earlier this spring against a strong player, former EPC bronze medalist. So, I'm not the favourite to win this rack by no means because I'm shooting solids here. I proceeded to win this rack without my opponent missing a single ball. Just pure 8-ball tactics. So, how would you proceed from here ? Oh, I also ran 2 more racks to make his incomplete 8-ball tactics cost him dearly Neither 6-ball nor 8-ball is touching the rail here.

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Remember, I'm not playing a newbie. You're there to make things turn to your favour, could be shot by shot but using methodical thinking, not relying on a stroke of luck.

I'll reveal later how this particular game turned into my favour after a couple of shots.

EDIT: there is a tempting shot here which would tempt the beginners but shouldn't tempt the advanced 8-ball tacticians.

 

[mjantti]

No takers yet ?

 

[Colin Colenso]

I may play it this way:
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Soft with side off the rail to bump the 8-ball up just a few inches to make the 6 ball on. Leaves him with a tricky out according to the angles of the balls in your diagram.

I may be missing a better idea I suspect

 

[Colin Colenso]

Another option is fouling on the 11 ball to tie it up behind the 8-ball.
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I'm interested to see how you finagled your way out of this situation without relying on any errors from your opponent.

 

[mjantti]

Another option is fouling on the 11 ball to tie it up behind the 8-ball.
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I'm interested to see how you finagled your way out of this situation without relying on any errors from your opponent.

Nope. This doesn't improve my situation. He'd just take away the 11-ball and leave the cueball near its original position.

Your earlier post is a little bit risky, this match is played with a brand new cloth (forgot to mention) and getting that kind of an angle is impossible without a masse.

Remember, in this situation you:
#1 don't want to leave an easy way to free the 8-ball with an insurance ball
#2 don't want your position to get worse
#3 are the underdog as long as your opponent has more balls than you on the table.

Ok, here's the shot I made. First, I thought to go with the rule #1 and tempt him making a mistake. Now, this is all about thinking what kind of shot your opponent would have if you'd make a certain move. And I made a "I tempt you" -move with this:
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Now, he has this and this doesn't provide an easy way to break a cluster with an insurance ball. If he had put one of his balls in front of a pocket here, I would have just moved his ball away from the pocket to get rid of the easy insurance ball.

He took my bait, and made a bad shot trying to break up the cluster by thinning the 8-ball while playing the position for his last ball. He would've been totally screwed if he had broken the cluster and left himself nothing on the 11-ball. (Definitely one of the reasons why I left him this shot)

His situation got worse, and mine went up on this bad shot. Now I thought I still have a chance to win this one.

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So, he had a terrible shot and continued with a semi-good shot by leaving the 11-ball near the pocket, somehow logical. He was afraid I'd try to kick to the 6-ball and leaving him snookered. But the kick would've been very risky, he had his ball hanging near the pocket. But he didn't know it was exactly what I was expecting for. So, how do you proceed from here what he left me (balls put where they finished):

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EDIT: Actually, there was one inning in between where he didn't leave me anything on the 11-ball and I just gave him another ball in hand and tempted him for making a ridiculously difficult cluster breaking from the other end of the table. He knew some tactics because he didn't go for the break up.

 

[mjantti]

Another option is fouling on the 11 ball to tie it up behind the 8-ball.
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I'm interested to see how you finagled your way out of this situation without relying on any errors from your opponent.

Well, my opponent made a few errors but not because he was bad, he was just left a couple of cunning low percentage shots from me.

 

[Colin Colenso]

Nope. This doesn't improve my situation. He'd just take away the 11-ball and leave the cueball near its original position.

Your earlier post is a little bit risky, this match is played with a brand new cloth (forgot to mention) and getting that kind of an angle is impossible without a masse.

Remember, in this situation you:
#1 don't want to leave an easy way to free the 8-ball with an insurance ball
#2 don't want your position to get worse
#3 are the underdog as long as your opponent has more balls than you on the table.

Ok, here's the shot I made. First, I thought to go with the rule #1 and tempt him making a mistake. Now, this is all about thinking what kind of shot your opponent would have if you'd make a certain move. And I made a "I tempt you" -move with this:
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Now, he has this and this doesn't provide an easy way to break a cluster with an insurance ball. If he had put one of his balls in front of a pocket here, I would have just moved his ball away from the pocket to get rid of the easy insurance ball.

He took my bait, and made a bad shot trying to break up the cluster by thinning the 8-ball while playing the position for his last ball. He would've been totally screwed if he had broken the cluster and left himself nothing on the 11-ball. (Definitely one of the reasons why I left him this shot)

His situation got worse, and mine went up on this bad shot. Now I thought I still have a chance to win this one.

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So, he had a terrible shot and continued with a semi-good shot by leaving the 11-ball near the pocket, somehow logical. He was afraid I'd try to kick to the 6-ball and leaving him snookered. But the kick would've been very risky, he had his ball hanging near the pocket. But he didn't know it was exactly what I was expecting for. So, how do you proceed from here what he left me (balls put where they finished):

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EDIT: Actually, there was one inning in between where he didn't leave me anything on the 11-ball and I just gave him another ball in hand and tempted him for making a ridiculously difficult cluster breaking from the other end of the table. He knew some tactics because he didn't go for the break up.

I can see what you were thinking, though I probably would have played to pot the 11 rather than double it up to the other end. Because if I got the speed a bit wrong he would have had a really good chance to break them out and get on it. The pot on the 11 seem easier to execute than this long bank safety.

However, in the current position you can't really go wrong. He's not gonna go for the kiss out so you may get several chances to hook him back off 3 rails such as this shot:
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[mjantti]

I can see what you were thinking, though I probably would have played to pot the 11 rather than double it up to the other end. Because if I got the speed a bit wrong he would have had a really good chance to break them out and get on it. The pot on the 11 seem easier to execute than this long bank safety.

However, in the current position you can't really go wrong. He's not gonna go for the kiss out so you may get several chances to hook him back off 3 rails such as this shot:
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Definitely not. The last thing I'd like to do here is to attempt a difficult safety while he has his last ball hanging. This would be the worst time to break up the 6-8 cluster, the 8-ball is way too easily opened up here and getting him hooked here would be a stroke of luck.

And even if I'd manage to get him hooked with a lucky shot, I'd leave him many possible shots:
He'd call a safety here, really big target to hit, and well, at least I'd be almost 75-85% favourite to hit this shot. I must assume he's also comfortable at kicking this ball.

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I wouldn't want to shoot a low percentage shot or even a 50-50 shot which would leave my opponent many options. I think that shot would lower my chances to win the rack.

Other suggestions ?

 

[Colin Colenso]

Definitely not. The last thing I'd like to do here is to attempt a difficult safety while he has his last ball hanging. This would be the worst time to break up the 6-8 cluster, the 8-ball is way too easily opened up here and getting him hooked here would be a stroke of luck.

And even if I'd manage to get him hooked with a lucky shot, I'd leave him many possible shots:
He'd call a safety here, really big target to hit, and well, at least I'd be almost 75-85% favourite to hit this shot. I must assume he's also comfortable at kicking this ball.

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I wouldn't want to shoot a low percentage shot or even a 50-50 shot which would leave my opponent many options. I think that shot would lower my chances to win the rack.

Other suggestions ?

Maybe you have something better, but that position looks advantageous to me.

By bumping the 8 away from the 6, if he fouls you can run out. If he gets out of the snooker then he has a difficult safety.

Shame there aren't too many contributing other ideas here...to early in the US. Looking forward to your suggested shot.

 

[pooladdict]

When you gave him ball in hand by playing the eleven up table, why couldn't he play the eleven in the corner, go one rail and hit the eight ball, probably making your 6-ball, have a decent shot on 13, and game over?

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Forget the arrows, I don't know how to remove them..

The way the diagram is, the 6ball looks pretty much dead on in the corner from the eight?

or is this option what you call: "EDIT: Actually, there was one inning in between where he didn't leave me anything on the 11-ball and I just gave him another ball in hand and tempted him for making a ridiculously difficult cluster breaking from the other end of the table. He knew some tactics because he didn't go for the break up. "

It doesn't look that ridiculous to me, if he misses th cluster he still has a safety option on the 13.

 

[bruin70]

am i missing something? why didn't your opponent just pocket the 11, drift down for the 13, go off two rails to break up the 6/8 by hitting the 6 head on,,,the 6 bouncing off the rail, and the 8 getting kicked further down for a shot to the lower right
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[mjantti]

Maybe you have something better, but that position looks advantageous to me.

By bumping the 8 away from the 6, if he fouls you can run out. If he gets out of the snooker then he has a difficult safety.

Shame there aren't too many contributing other ideas here...to early in the US. Looking forward to your suggested shot.

The snooker espace looks really too easy for me (him), and your shot proposed too many risks and by analyzing the situation and his possible countermoves, I made this shot:

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So, after thinking a while about his possible countermoves, I made him shoot the 8-ball with BIH. I knew I was about to get hooked but I hoped he'd have trouble with the slippery & brand new cloth and controlling the 6-ball. He definitely wouldn't want to make the 6-ball because then I'd either have an open shot with the 8-ball or an easy safety. I figured out if he'd play a good shot on the 8-ball and leaving my 6-ball at position "A", I'd just roll the 8-ball back to marry with the 6-ball and not leaving him the bank with ball in hand.

If he had thinned the 8-ball and leaving me uptable, I'd have had an easy kick at the 6-ball. If he had left the 6-ball at "A", I'd have had a countermove. But what happened (exactly what I hoped) was that he shot the hook a fraction too hard and hung the 6-ball like this:

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This was the best shot I could have hoped for. I actually had all his moves covered before he took this shot and at this stage I had turned a seemingly hopeless situation to slightly in my favour and the next shot made my day because I had been practising them quite a lot and felt really comfortable 2-rail kicking the 6-ball in and playing position for the 8-ball. If I haven't had a good position for the 8-ball, I would have just left him a tough safety or tried a possible high percentage bank (the pockets were huge and very accepting because of the new cloth). But I executed the kick perfectly using an easy system to figure out the aiming point to get perfect result.

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Any of these shots made sense ? The important parts were:
-I was always thinking of the possible countermove. Hooking my opponent but with a good chance of leaving myself in trouble is not a good idea in 8-ball, especially when playing a top notch player.
-I didn't panic and go for the first slim chance of opportunity to win the game. I gradually grinded him down.
-Sometimes it's useful to shoot your opponent balls down to limit his options. Especially if there's a major congestion at the table and no easy way to break them apart for neither player.

I bet my opponent gave himself a good beating after that rack realizing he didn't give me much trouble and went for the low percentage shots in order to win the rack which seemed to go to him anyway in the first place. Running 2 more racks after stealing this one made me feel much more confident (I think this was when I was leading 3-2, and after his mistakes he got to the table after my dry break at 6-2, race to 8 and I won 8-4).

 

[mjantti]

When you gave him ball in hand by playing the eleven up table, why couldn't he play the eleven in the corner, go one rail and hit the eight ball, probably making your 6-ball, have a decent shot on 13, and game over?

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Forget the arrows, I don't know how to remove them..

The way the diagram is, the 6ball looks pretty much dead on in the corner from the eight?

or is this option what you call: "EDIT: Actually, there was one inning in between where he didn't leave me anything on the 11-ball and I just gave him another ball in hand and tempted him for making a ridiculously difficult cluster breaking from the other end of the table. He knew some tactics because he didn't go for the break up. "

It doesn't look that ridiculous to me, if he misses th cluster he still has a safety option on the 13.

Yep, I agree. He had a possibility there, but I think he was afraid of the scratch in the corner if he'd miss the 6-8 package. The pockets were huuuuge and the scratch was definitely on. Maybe he had trouble controlling the rock on a brand new cloth, I always do, it's so rare to have a chance to play on new cloth.

 

[mjantti]

am i missing something? why didn't your opponent just pocket the 11, drift down for the 13, go off two rails to break up the 6/8 by hitting the 6 head on,,,the 6 bouncing off the rail, and the 8 getting kicked further down for a shot to the lower right
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Getting a nice break angle is not sure and probably he was afraid of breaking up the cluster and getting hooked or getting a bad shot at the 8-ball. We were both playing quite badly until this rack came and neither of us felt really comfortable on shooting on a brand new cloth.

But again, I gave him a chance to make the bad shots. And he did take the bait and played them.

EDIT: thanks for your inputs.

 

[Colin Colenso]

I think you got bit lucky using those choices of shots. You're opponent messed up.

I definitely wouldn't have given him BIH on the 8 ball. A good player should have got you from here I think. He just plays to hook the CB in behind the black akwardly and seperate the balls enough so he can pot up the top if you foul.

Also, I think it was risky to play the 2 rail position for the 8 ball. Why not just easy across for the long pot? The 2 rail shot can go badly wrong, especially as you mention on an unfamilar surface.

The thing is with these strategies is that a lot of it comes down to execution once you have chosen a shot and then hoping your opponent misses.

btw: I don't think the long rail kissout into the 8-6 cluster is a high percentage shot for your opponent. I would prefer the BIH you gave him.

I assume this last two balls on the rail is a common end game. Would like to know from experienced players which ball they'd prefer to be on in theis duel. The 8 or 6 ball, starting BIH on the 8 ball.

Most my end game play is in 2 shot rules, so I have to speculate on this one. In two shot rules the 2 on black guy is a 90% winner.

 

[Colin Colenso]

btw: I like this kind of end game strategy challenge. Thanks for starting the thread. I would be good to do a few more!

 

[mjantti]

btw: I like this kind of end game strategy challenge. Thanks for starting the thread. I would be good to do a few more!

Yep, I was looking for getting some more input and see what other players think when they face a little bit awkward end game situation. I know I got lucky, but the point was that I didn't want to play a stupid shot and hand over the game to my opponent. As it seems in major tournaments, sometimes the pressure gets to you and you make stupid shots. Apparently that happened to my opponent or he just wasn't familiar with this kind of tactics. His facial expressions also revealed that he was a little bit lost when I started making intentional fouls. He probably expected me to break up the cluster hoping to get lucky and hand him the game

 

[mjantti]

btw: I don't think the long rail kissout into the 8-6 cluster is a high percentage shot for your opponent. I would prefer the BIH you gave him.

I assume this last two balls on the rail is a common end game. Would like to know from experienced players which ball they'd prefer to be on in theis duel. The 8 or 6 ball, starting BIH on the 8 ball.

I'd definitely be shooting at the 8-ball. But, if the balls are near the corner pocket, funny things can happen if you are shooting the 8-ball. You just have to look at each situation with enough brainwork to figure out the best shot.

And I think I was the underdog all the way. My point was to try to make my each shot make his runout a little bit harder and also prepare for his different countermoves. Too many players go for some certain shots and afterwards realize they left the opponent a lifeline, a good way to get out of the trap you carefully built for him. Admitted, if I'd be playing against an 8-ball specialist, I would have lost the rack but I would've given a full run for his money refusing to give away the game.

 

[Cornerman]

Here's a situation I faced in European Champs earlier this spring against a strong player, former EPC bronze medalist. So, I'm not the favourite to win this rack by no means because I'm shooting solids here. I proceeded to win this rack without my opponent missing a single ball. Just pure 8-ball tactics. So, how would you proceed from here ? Oh, I also ran 2 more racks to make his incomplete 8-ball tactics cost him dearly Neither 6-ball nor 8-ball is touching the rail here.

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I figure you for 90% to lose here against intermediates, and 97% to lose against a EPC Bronze Medalist.

I say, kick him in the nutz while he is distracted. When he gets his senses back, tell him that you are shooting on the stripes.

Or, pot one of his balls and lessen his percentages. If I had a choice, I pot the 11-ball. If I was looking for the miracle, I'd try a shot that would move both of his balls up table. I wouldn't move only one bal (say, the 11-ball) up table. That would increase his percentages.

Fred <~~~ no answers. figures to lose

 

[Cornerman]

Ok, here's the shot I made. First, I thought to go with the rule #1 and tempt him making a mistake. Now, this is all about thinking what kind of shot your opponent would have if you'd make a certain move. And I made a "I tempt you" -move with this:
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Wow. Just what I thought was the worst move possible.

He took my bait, and made a bad shot trying to break up the cluster by thinning the 8-ball while playing the position for his last ball. He would've been totally screwed if he had broken the cluster and left himself nothing on the 11-ball. (Definitely one of the reasons why I left him this shot)

His situation got worse, and mine went up on this bad shot. Now I thought I still have a chance to win this one.

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:

My goodness. His shot was the worst thing possible. Mikko, I have to say that your shot wouldn't/shouldn't work. But, I'm glad you won.

Fred