There is, in the South West of these Islands, a Billiards League which was formed 62 years ago in 1928, (That's even longer than the Teesside Boys!) which is still running and which has never formed a Snooker section, repeat, never formed a Snooker section, and as far as is known has never even bought a set of snooker-balls. It's hard to believe in these days when every boy who ever sees a table wants to be Steven Hendry, but is nevertheless true. The league is the Sandford Orcas Billiards League. The Sandford Orcas area lies peacefully between the better known towns of Yeovil and Sherbourne. Yeovil was once famous for its giant-killing football team. In 1949 they entertained (!) Sunderland and beat them by two goals to one thus reaching the fifth round where they were walloped 8-0 by Man. U. Sherbourne lies a mile or two to the South and is more scholastically inclined. Most of its inhabitants I imagine would consider the F.A. Cup to be a rather vulgar affair, whilst just a little further South is East Coker made famous, or relatively so, by T. S. Eliot in his, "Four Quartets."
The League was formed in 1928 at a meeting held in the Sandford Orcas village Hall founder members being the villages of Marston Magna, Mudford, Trent, Oborn, and -Sandford Orcas. The very names are suggestive of the rural England of Thomas Hardy as opposed to the urban sprawl of the 90s, not everything that changes changes for the better. From those beginnings the League is still going strong and has twenty teams playing in two divisions.
The leading light behind the formation of the League was a Mr. Len Adams. Adams was a great lover of the game and held the posts of League Secretary and Treasurer for 31 years. He was no great player but he did jointly hold the record break for the first season - 37. During the first years it was a condition of entry that all games should be played on three-quarter sized tables and it was not until 1949 that matches were allowed to be played on full-sized tables. Teams consisted of 6 players and games of 120 up, this has changed to the present day system of 4 men playing 150 up off individual handicaps.
The standard of play improved slowly. It was not until 1933 that a fifty was made and the pre-war top break was only 57. Quite clearly the baulk-line rule and the limitations on nursery-cannon play did not cause any sleepless nights to the sturdy yeomen of Dorset.
It was not until 1975 that Jack Masters of Wincanton made the first century - 104, though a year or two before one Roy Foster of Sandford had made a 98.
I should think not. At one time there were no less than five parsons playing in the league whilst yet another one was League Chairman. It must be rather frustrating if your opponent is a parson and getting a fluke or two. Firstly there is the temptation to think that the game is unfair because the run of the balls is being watched over by authority from on high, and secondly because it would make one somewhat inhibited over the matter of using a few four-letter words - not that any Billiard player would do that of course.
They do get a bit of snow down there in winter and when there was a heavy fall back in the fifties, the present League Chairman, Mr. Gordon Moore, claims to have walked from Sandford to both Oborne and Sherbourne on top of the hedgerows. On another night when the snow was frozen solid, he was walking downhill into Trent when he dropped his cue case which swished away into the night like a runaway ski coming to a convenient stop right outside Trent Village Hall where he recovered it with the cue nicely warmed up ready for play. On another occasion a leaky roof in the Oborne Village Hall meant that the game had to played round a bucket placed on the table to catch the drips. It was also at Oborne that a player, tired of asking the Committee in vain to re-cloth the table, in attempting a deep screw shot, managed to slide three or four foot of his cue under the cloth thus forcing the Committees hand. These sound like tall yarns to me but the best one is, I think, said to have happened at Keinton Mandeville where a player gave the balls a mighty whack only to see the red leap from the table, bounce on the hearth and disappear into the middle of a blazing fire. They carried on with just the two white balls. Well, I've heard of red-ball play, but white-ball play and NO red ball sounds like hard work. It's not exactly easy believing it and I wonder if those wily country birds are not intent on pulling we city dwellers legs, and especially as it seems that some teams used to send in their result cards to the League secretary with green-shield stamps in place of the normal "Liz's Head," variety - and get them delivered.
All this and No Snooker. Viva and Long Live The Sandford Orcas League.