David’s snookered for local venues to play

“It's a 90-kilometre round trip and, I worked out recently, I've done 2,200 kilometres —  to play snooker!” says retired Orange businessman and life-long snooker enthusiast David Williams.

A “Ten Pound Pom” who made Australia home in the 1960s, David grew up playing the game in his home county of Lancashire, facing the likes of future champion and television commentator, John Virgo.

“He came from my hometown, we were in the Boys’ Brigade together,” recalls David. “He was a schoolboy champion at 16… I played against him, but I was going around the table putting the black up all the time! I did get a few good pots…”

In Australia, David continued to play competitively over the years, his home games room at Clifton Grove proudly displaying trophies he’s won at various tournaments in Perth, Canberra and elsewhere.

Recently, after laying his cue aside for two decades, David rediscovered his love for the game and has been doing his best to revive local interest in snooker. But his main problem has been finding somewhere to play.

“Newstead [Bowling Club] had closed and they’d sold the table. I used to live next door to Duntryleague and that had two tables, now sold,” says David of the disappearance of full-sized snooker tables, once ubiquitous in clubs everywhere in Australia.

“And I couldn't find anywhere else. Then I twigged… Molong!”

The Molong RSL Club is home to one of the only full-sized public snooker tables in the region, says David, who has now been making the weekly drive from Clifton Grove for nearly three years.

And interest in snooker has really grown in Molong. “When I joined two-and-a-half years ago we had about 32 signed up… presently, it's at 86 or 90,” says David. At the RSL, players can sink beers cheaper than at a pub, and the snooker is free all day. “They're not paying three dollars a game. If I was a young bloke, that's where I’d be!”

But as David’s wife has not welcomed his suggestion that they sell up and move to Molong, he would really like to find a game a little closer to home.

“It's a long way to go at night, the roads are pretty dangerous with the kangaroos and things and that's what's making me think about wanting to play more in Orange,” says David, who adds that the cost at the bowser also hurts the hip pocket.

“If I had big money, I could lease a room in town and get a second-hand table,” he says wistfully.

David approached Orange City Life to see if there are others in Orange with an interest in playing snooker, whether it be joining him for the drive over to Molong or, ultimately, getting a local venue for snooker here in Orange.

He needs little prompting to get him talking about the benefits of the game.

“You've got to use your mind, you've got to do the scoring, you got to look at the angles,” he explains. “And you play three or four games of snooker in competitive tournaments — that’s pretty tiring. You're walking around the table, doing lots of stretching and hand movement, you can feel it in your chest and your arms when you play. 

“And you just meet more people… the people I’ve met over the years!” 

Want to play snooker? You can email David on dl.ma.williams@gmail.com