Snooker gained popularity as a pub sport along with darts for most of the 20th century. Snooker is similar to chess in the sense that one player plays a turn, then the next player plays their turn, one at a time. In fact, snooker can be played like a game of chess, anticipating the player’s next move and playing accordingly. However, snooker is relatively faster and players can finish a frame in 7 to 15 minutes and a game in under an hour to a couple of hours. Today, snooker is played as a global sport on a much higher level. So punters have a lot more opportunities, tournaments, and leagues to bet on. While snooker has a way to go before it goes into the top 5 betting sports across the globe, it’s en route to making that list in the future. Before we dive into how to bet on snooker, it’s important that punters understand how the game is played to identify opportunities during the game.
How Is Snooker Played?
Two or four players (doubles) can play a game of snooker. The objective of the game is to finish all the balls on the table by pocketing them in any of the 6 holes on the table. In the end, the player with the most points (usually the one that pockets the most balls) wins. Different colored balls have different points.
- A snooker player uses a white ball or cue ball to hit other balls into any pocket.
- A player must always hit a red ball first. A red ball is worth 1 point and there are 15 red balls on the table at the start of the game.
- After pocketing a red ball, a player has to hit a ball of another color apart from red. The player can hit yellow (worth 2 points), green (worth 3 points), brown (worth 4 points), blue (worth 5 points), pink (worth 6 points), and black (worth 7 points).
- After a player hits a colored ball, the ball is placed back on the table. The player must hit a red ball again and repeat the process until they miss a shot. If they miss any shot, then the other player gets an opportunity to accumulate points.
- After all the red balls are finished, then the colored balls are hit in ascending order until all balls are cleared off the table.
- The maximum points a player can make (without fouls) in a game is 147 points.
Fun fact: Ronnie O’Sullivan has the most 147 breakpoints in professional snooker, making him one of the game’s legends.
How To Bet On Snooker?
Punters have access to various betting markets before and in-play, various types of betting markets, bets based on rankings and seedings as well as adopting strategies.
1. Type Of Bets
Punters can bet on various types of bets in a snooker game apart from the outright winner. Bettors can bet on the difference in points indicating whether it’s going to be a close game or not, the first colored ball, first foul, time to finish the frame, frames to win a set, and so on. If a punter tracks certain players or tournaments, they can easily spot the different types of bets and in which favor they lean.
2. Ranking And Seeding
Players are always ranked in general and seeded for tournaments and championships. A ranking system helps determine where individual players stand. Different countries have ranking systems for selecting players to represent their countries. Seeding helps determine how players who are participating in a tournament rank with each other. The highest-seeded player, or 1, will be the favorite to win. Punters can identify players in the top 5 with a potential to win and good odds on that player to win a profitable bet.
3. Adopting Strategies
All professional and successful punters adopt different snooker betting strategies and stick to it and profit in the long-run. Strategies extend to bankroll management strategies to actual snooker betting strategies such as the Martingale betting system. In fact, using accumulator bets can result in much higher profits versus betting on a tournament’s outright winner. Both systems involve the same process. However, predicting the result of each game and match can be harder. And punters that take the risk and get it right are aptly rewarded for it. Moreover, punters can bet on several games at once during tournaments and make a profit.
