Perfection required but it’s not beyond Lim

By TERRANCE VOON

IT HAPPENED, not quite by accident, on a typical Saturday afternoon at a packed snooker hall in Toa Payoh.

All eyes were on Marvin Lim, the national player whose match against a sparring partner had suddenly turned serious.

A single black ball remained on the green baize in front of him. And, with 140 points on the board behind him, he was on the verge of a maximum break of 147 — the most coveted of feats in the sport.

Time froze. No one spoke. The silence, eventually, was punctured by the sound of the ball hitting the bottom of the pocket.

Cue rapturous applause and back slaps from strangers. Cue relief from Lim, who had spent the last 22 years of his career pining for a perfect day like this.

“For all snooker players, 147 is a magical number,” he said of his accomplishment, which took place three months ago.

“It’s a shame I didn’t do it in an actual competition, but that’s something new I will aim for now.”

The 36-year-old is travelling to Palembang this week for the SEA Games, where he will be defending Singapore’s gold medal in the snooker doubles event with Tommy Ang. Both men will also take part in the singles competition.

A maximum break is unlikely at the tournament, admits Lim.

In the heat of competition, he is a conservative, safety-first player, one who loves to frustrate his opponents rather than attack them.

It is no surprise that the tactical side of the game appeals most to Lim, whose first love was Chinese chess, before he discovered the joys of knocking around coloured balls in smoky snooker parlours inhabited by teen gangs and hustlers.

That was in 1994, when he was 14. Today, snooker halls are smoke-free and gambling-free zones, though their unsavoury reputation has lingered.

“One of my goals is to change the image of snooker,” said Lim, a polytechnic diploma holder turned pro snooker player and coach. “It’s a gentleman’s game, and it requires more tactics and skill than people give it credit for.”

He will need all the tricks he can muster to retain his SEA Games gold, won under the cover of anonymity two years ago.

He and Ang are no longer underdogs, and their task has been made even tougher by the changes to the competition rules.

Each match will be played in a best-of-three format, instead of the usual best-of-five. This means that a player needs to claim just two frames to win a match — narrowing the margin of error for top players.

“It levels the playing field because good players will always prevail over longer matches,” Lim said. “It’s like tossing a coin now.”

Perfection is required once again for the gold medal. But, as Lim discovered recently, it is not beyond him. tvoon@sph.com.sg