Pool has long been popular in the US, Canada, Australia, Taiwan, the Philippines and the Republic of Ireland, where many bars and youth centres will have a table and a selection of cues (usually of variable quality). The game has gone through periods of popularity in the UK, although snooker has always been more dominant, boosted by television coverage on the BBC and other terrestrial broadcasters since the 1970s.
The perceived junior game, an erroneous view because snooker is derived from it, is now enjoying a higher profile thanks to digital TV and streaming. The UK-based Ultimate Pool Group organises and promotes a variety of 8-ball pool events, primarily in England, all of which are shown on its own streamed subscription platform, ultimatepool.tv. In addition to this the organisation stages events every Monday night that are broadcast live in 66 countries, with TNT Sports showing it in the UK.
Right now, Ultimate Pool is in the midst of its Pairs Cup series, Week 19 of which began on 21 October. Earlier this month Men’s Tour 6 concluded in Malta, which now has its own Ultimate Pool franchise, with Johan Attard winning this phase of the competition and a place in the Grand Finals on 23 October. As Simon Webb, one of Ultimate Pool’s commentators and a former international player, explains, the game is immensely popular on the Mediterranean island as well as in other European countries.
“It’s absolutely huge in France,” he says, “as it is in Malta. I’ve had the pleasure of playing out there and if you’re a top pool player in Malta, you’re a superstar. Ultimate Pool Malta is really taking off but there are plenty of nations covered within the Pro Series, including France, Australia, New Zealand and Morocco.”
The events Ultimate Pool promotes or sponsors, including this year’s World Eightball Pool Federation (WEPF) World Championships in June, feature the British variant of 8-ball pool, also known as blackball pool. This is played using unnumbered coloured balls (apart from the black 8-ball itself) on a 7ft x 4ft table, aka an English table.
As well as competitions in the UK and Malta, Ultimate Pool also began organising events in the US in April this year. As Webb explains, this was a remote production, something he has seen increase in use during the past four years. “We sent over camera operators to shoot the games in Louisiana,” he comments. “The signal was sent back to the UK and mixed in a production suite in Birmingham. It’s something that was sped up by Covid and now everyone wants remote production.”
The standard set-up for covering match play consists of a main camera, known as camera one, an overhead camera, which Webb says is often a GoPro, and two wheeled cameras that are worked by operators moving round the table. Camera one is supported on a 7.5 metre tripod but set, Webb estimates, at approximately a maximum of 3 metres. “It’s positioned eight to ten feet from the end of the table, which gives the shot that everyone knows from snooker coverage showing the table from the bottom end and looking up to the top.”
The presentation studio is usually covered by two cameras, although sometimes a third is brought in when necessary. “Maybe for the bigger show we might have a roaming camera,” Webb says. “The wheeled cameras used round the table are usually specialist models to allow for slo-mo replays. Those can be done in the production suite but you also get beautiful slo-mos from within the camera. That’s often used for the replay of the break in particular because it’s such a key shot.”
The audio side involves effects microphones in the arena and handheld mics for the presenters in the studio. For the production, commentators use either headset mics or Coles lip microphones and describe the action from a room separate to the playing area, watching on monitors. “Nine times out of ten we will be using headsets,” he says. “Years ago we used to be quite close to the action whispering into our microphones but the problem was the players could hear us, which was not great. Now we have a separate room for commentary where we can see all the camera angles. I don’t think you lack anything from not being able to see the table in person, as it were.”
Webb comments that he has also covered snooker, and TV techniques for that game are often incorporated into pool coverage and vice versa. One production element widely used in snooker is the telestrator, which allows a commentator – usually an ex-player – to trace out a possible shot while the player on the table is considering what to do. This was used for a time in pool but Webb says it was not entirely practical. “With pool – and Ultimate Pool in particular – it’s too fast paced to use those systems,” he explains. “The players are making a shot in 15 seconds, so a commentator hasn’t got time to draw lines on a screen.”
Fans of pool now have a wide choice of outlets and platforms on which to watch the game, ranging from traditional linear broadcasting to streaming and social media. “Our main outlet is TNT Sports in the UK on Monday nights,” Webb comments. “We also broadcast to 65 TV stations in other countries. On top of that we have a lot of events at weekends and other times that we will show on our own platform, which is a subscription service. There’s also an app for Ultimate Pool and as well as that we will stream on social media, with the majority of it on Facebook but there’s YouTube as well.”
Right now pool is experiencing a surge in popularity, if the sales of tables are anything to go by. It is also now reported to be, by a YouGov survey, the 12th most popular physical activity and the 43rd most popular activity overall in the UK. The game’s wide media availability is no doubt helping considerably.