Snookers Required: Meaning, Maths and When to Concede
The snookers required meaning explained for UK players: how to count the points left, how many snookers a deficit needs, and when the rules allow a concession.
By CricketTaken EditorialPublished Snooker Rules22 min read
- Points left with 15 reds
- 147
- Points left on the colours
- 27
- Smallest foul penalty
- 4 points
- Largest foul penalty
- 7 points
The small figure in the corner of a television scoreboard tells the whole story. When it reads "Remaining: 43" and one player trails by 51, the commentator will say the frame has gone to snookers required, and anybody in a snooker hall in England knows what follows: the player behind will start hiding the cue ball rather than potting.
Snookers required means the points left on the table are fewer than the gap between the scores. A player in that position cannot win by potting balls alone, because even a total clearance falls short. The only other source of points in snooker is the opponent's fouls, so the trailing player has to lay snookers, forcing fouls worth four to seven points each until the gap is small enough for a clearance to win. Under the WPBSA rules used on the World Snooker Tour and in British club leagues, that moment also unlocks a second thing: from then on, and not before, a player may concede the frame.
What snookers required means in the scoring rules
Two numbers decide it, and both can be read off any professional scoreboard. The first is the difference between the scores. The second is the maximum a player could score from the balls still on the table. If the difference is larger, the player behind needs snookers. If it is equal, the player needs every point and the frame would finish level, going to a re-spotted black. If it is smaller, the frame can still be won by potting.
The rulebook never defines "snookers required" as a phrase. The nearest thing to it is the wording the WPBSA uses in the concession and miss rules: a player "requires penalty points". That is the precise version. Snookers are the usual way of getting penalty points, but a foul can come from anywhere: a loose safety that drops the cue ball in a pocket, an in-off, a push, a ball touched with a sleeve. When commentators say "needs two snookers", they mean "needs at least two fouls of normal value", and the snooker is shorthand for the most reliable way of forcing one.
The term "snooker" itself is defined in Section 2, Rule 17 of the rules. The cue ball is snookered when a straight-line stroke to every ball on is wholly or partly blocked by a ball that is not on. If any ball on can be hit at both extreme edges without obstruction, the cue ball is not snookered. A cushion cannot snooker the cue ball. And when the cue ball is in hand, it is snookered only if it is blocked from every possible position in the D.
Why the phrase survives
Snooker is the only major cue sport in which a player who is losing can still win without scoring a single ball through their own play, at least for a while. The phrase marks the point at which the game changes character. Before it, both players are trying to pot. After it, one of them is trying to make the other foul. A frame can sit in that state until the balls run out.
Counting the points remaining: eight for a red, 27 for the colours
Every red is worth one point, and every red potted lets the striker try for a colour. The highest colour is the black at seven, so each red represents a maximum of eight. When the last red has gone and its colour has been taken, the six colours are potted in order, yellow to black, for 2+3+4+5+6+7, which is 27.
So the formula with reds on the table is reds left multiplied by eight, plus 27. With all fifteen reds, that is 120 plus 27, or 147, the maximum break. The full values of every ball, and why the order of the colours is fixed, are on our page on snooker ball values and order.
| Reds left on the table | Points remaining | Points remaining if a red has just been potted |
|---|---|---|
| 15 | 147 | not possible at the start |
| 10 | 107 | 114 |
| 6 | 75 | 82 |
| 4 | 59 | 66 |
| 2 | 43 | 50 |
| 1 | 35 | 42 |
| 0 (colour still to come after the last red) | 27 | 34 |
The right-hand column covers the moment just after a red has gone in, when a colour is still owed. Add seven for that colour, because the black is the best one the striker could take. The scoreboards on television handle this automatically. A club scorer with a pencil does not, and leaving out that extra seven is an easy slip in club arithmetic.
Maximum points left at the start of a visit with this many reds on the table, assuming no colour is owed. Each red is counted at eight, red plus black.
Show the numbers
| Item | Points remaining |
|---|---|
| 15 reds | 147points |
| 12 reds | 123points |
| 9 reds | 99points |
| 6 reds | 75points |
| 3 reds | 51points |
| 1 red | 35points |
| No reds | 27points |
The colours, one by one
Once the reds are gone and the last colour after them has been taken, the arithmetic becomes a list. The yellow is on, then the green, then the brown and so on. The remaining total drops each time a colour goes down, and it drops by an uneven amount, which is why players trailing late in a frame count very carefully.
One subtlety the formula hides. A red that is potted during a foul stays down. Reds are not re-spotted. So a foul that sends a red into a pocket cuts the points remaining by eight at a stroke, and a player who was not quite needing snookers can suddenly need them, or need more of them, even though no legal pot has been made.
How many snookers: dividing the shortfall
Take the gap, subtract the points remaining, and the result is the shortfall: the number of penalty points the trailing player has to collect before a clearance can at least tie. Then divide by the value of a typical foul.
That typical value is four while the reds, yellow, green or brown are on, because none of those balls is worth more than four and four is the minimum penalty. It is five with the blue on, and six with the pink. The rules value most fouls at the ball on or the ball concerned, whichever is higher, which means a snooker that makes the opponent hit a higher-value ball first is worth more than four. A snooker on the reds that results in the black being struck first earns seven. Nothing earns more than seven; the black is the ceiling.
| Ball on | Points remaining | Deficit | Shortfall | Snookers of normal value to tie |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Red, 4 reds left | 59 | 66 | 7 | Two at four |
| Red, 2 reds left | 43 | 48 | 5 | Two at four, or one hitting blue, pink or black |
| Brown | 22 | 30 | 8 | Two at four |
| Blue | 18 | 23 | 5 | One at five |
| Pink | 13 | 25 | 12 | Two at six |
Look at the blue row. One snooker on the blue brings five points, and five points closes the shortfall exactly. That leaves the player needing every remaining ball to tie, and a tie at the end of a frame goes to the procedure described in our guide to the re-spotted black in snooker. To win the frame outright, rather than force a re-spot, the trailing player needs one point more than the shortfall: six, which means either a second snooker or one that makes the opponent hit the pink or black first.
The pink example worked through
Trailing by 25 with the pink on is a common late-frame position. Pink and black left are worth 13. The shortfall is twelve. A snooker on the pink that causes a miss gives six. Two such snookers give twelve, levelling the shortfall but not passing it, so the trailing player then needs pink and black to tie. To get a lead, they need a third foul, or one foul where the opponent strikes the black instead of the pink, which is valued at seven.
That is why commentators often say "needs two snookers, and really three". Both numbers are correct. The first is the number to make the frame tie; the second is the number to win it outright.
Why the count moves while the frame is played
The calculation is a snapshot, and it goes stale with every stroke. Three things change it, and a player chasing snookers watches all of them.
The first is a pot by the leader. Each red the leader takes adds at least one to the deficit and removes eight from the points remaining, so a red followed by the black widens the shortfall by sixteen: eight on to the deficit, eight off the table. A player needing one snooker who lets the opponent in for a red and a black needs five. This is why trailing players lay snookers that leave nothing to pot on the escape, even at the cost of a less awkward snooker.
The second is a pot by the trailing player. Potting a red and a colour shortens the deficit and the remaining total together, so the shortfall does not change. That surprises people. A clearance does not reduce the number of snookers required; only fouls do. What potting buys is a better position for the next snooker, usually by moving the ball on into a place where it is easy to hide behind something.
The third is the ball on itself. As the frame moves from the reds to the colours and up through them, the minimum value of a foul climbs from four to five and then six. A shortfall of twelve needs three snookers on the brown and two on the pink. Players a long way behind sometimes choose to pot the yellow, green and brown first and lay their snookers on the pink, where each one is worth half as much again.
None of this appears on a scoreboard. The graphic shows the deficit and the points left, and leaves the strategy to the player.
Frame ball and the point at which a frame is safe
"Frame ball" is the pot that leaves the opponent needing snookers. Before it, the opponent can still win by potting. After it, they cannot.
Commentators treat that as the moment the frame is effectively decided, and statistically it nearly is. But a frame-ball pot does not end anything under the rules. It moves the opponent from "needs to pot" to "needs to force fouls", and fouls happen. A player who pots frame ball and then plays a slack positional shot into a snooker has given the opponent a route back.
The professional term for a lead that cannot be overturned at all is different: "a frame is over" only when it is over, by concession, by the claim or award rule on the last black, or by the final pot or foul. Between frame ball and the end of the frame, the leader still has work to do. Most professionals keep scoring after frame ball until the opponent concedes, because every extra ball potted adds to the shortfall and turns "needs one snooker" into "needs three".
The claim on the final black
There is one point where needing snookers ends without any further play. Section 2, Rule 1 of the WPBSA rules describes how a frame is completed. One of the routes is a claim: when the black is the only object ball remaining, aggregate points are not relevant, and there is a difference of more than seven points in the striker's favour, the striker may claim the frame. If the difference is in the non-striker's favour, the frame is awarded to them.
The logic is that once only the black is left, the trailing player cannot lay a snooker. There is no other ball to hide behind. A foul on the black gives seven at most, and the frame ends on the first pot or foul, so a player more than seven behind cannot recover. The rules simply stop the frame there rather than making both players go through the motions.
Laying the snooker and where the points come from
A snooker is a safety shot with a target. The trailing player plays the cue ball behind a ball that is not on, so that the opponent cannot hit the ball on directly. The opponent then has to escape, usually off one or more cushions, and any failure to hit the ball on first is a foul.
The choice of hiding ball matters more than most club players realise. With reds on, the striker who leaves the cue ball behind the black creates two ways to earn seven: a miss that strikes the black first, or an escape that clips the black. Behind the yellow, the same miss is worth four. Professionals laying snookers on the reds therefore look for the black, the pink or the blue as the snookering ball. On the colours, the ball on rises in value as the frame goes on, so even a snooker behind the yellow earns five with the blue on.
- 4pointsYellow, green or brown on
- 5pointsBlue on
- 6pointsPink on
- 7pointsBlack on
The penalty for missing the ball on, assuming the cue ball strikes nothing else first. A snooker that forces the opponent onto a higher-value ball earns that ball's value instead.
The three ways a snooker pays
An escape has two jobs. Hit the ball on, and leave nothing behind worth potting. A player escaping a snooker with the cue ball travelling three cushions sometimes hits the ball on cleanly and then sees the cue ball roll into a pocket, which is a foul worth at least four. Snookers produce points in three ways: the miss, the wrong ball, and the cue ball lost on the escape.
The full schedule of fouls and their values is in our guide to snooker fouls and penalties. For snookers required, what matters is the floor of four and the ceiling of seven.
The miss rule once snookers are needed
The foul-and-a-miss rule, Section 3 Rule 14, requires a striker to make a genuine attempt to hit the ball on. If the referee thinks the attempt was not good enough, the call is "foul and a miss", and the opponent can ask for the balls to be put back and the shot played again.
Once penalty points are needed, the rule largely stops applying. The referee does not call a miss if any player required penalty points before, or as a result of, the stroke, provided the referee is satisfied the miss was not intentional. The reasoning is that a player who is far enough ahead does not need to be forced into a genuine attempt, because the opponent's interest in the frame is now limited to collecting fouls. Making the leader replay the stroke repeatedly would hand the trailing player points that a good escape could not avoid.
There is one important exception. Where a clear, full-ball contact was available and the striker missed, a second failure from the original position is called as a foul and a miss regardless of the scores. So a player who needs to protect a lead cannot keep deliberately missing an easy ball. The detail of how warnings work under the miss rule, and the three-miss sequence, is in our guide to the miss rule in snooker.
How a free ball changes the arithmetic
A free ball is awarded when a foul leaves the incoming player snookered. The player can nominate any other ball as the ball on for one stroke, and if it is potted, it scores the value of the ball on and is then re-spotted. That re-spotting is what matters here: the nominated ball comes back onto the table, so the points it represents are counted twice.
With reds on, a free ball nominated as a red scores one, and the striker then plays a colour, normally the black for seven. That is eight extra points on top of the points remaining. On the colours, a free ball nominated in place of the colour on scores that colour's value, and then the real colour is still there to be potted. With the yellow on, a free ball adds two; with the blue on, five.
A worked example
Three reds left, so 51 points remaining. Trailing by 60. The shortfall is nine, so the player needs three snookers at four each, or two if one of them earns seven.
The trailing player lays a snooker. The opponent fails to hit a red and strikes nothing, a foul of four points. The deficit is now 56. The cue ball has been left snookered, so the referee calls free ball. With a free ball nominated as a red, the points available rise from 51 to 59.
Fifty-nine is more than 56. The player who needed three snookers before that foul now needs none. A single snooker, followed by a free ball, has done the work of three. That is the single most important thing to understand about snookers required: the number of snookers needed is not fixed between strokes, and a foul that leaves a free ball can collapse it entirely. Our guide to the snooker free ball rule covers when the call is made and what the striker may not do with the nominated ball.
The reverse also happens. A player taking a free ball cannot leave the opponent snookered behind the nominated ball on a stroke that pots nothing, except when the pink and black are the only object balls left. That restriction matters to a player who needs snookers, because the obvious snookering ball may be the very ball just nominated.
Conceding under the rules of snooker
Section 4, Rule 2 of the WPBSA rules covers concessions. Its wording is plainer than people expect, and it has changed over the years.
The current text says a player may offer a concession, but the concession becomes null and void if the opponent chooses to play on. An offer, or an acceptance, cannot be withdrawn. Earlier editions of the rules allowed a player to concede only when they were the striker at the table, a restriction that does not appear in the present wording. A player who reads an old rulebook in a club will find the older version.
A concession is the first route listed in Section 2 for completing a frame: "an accepted concession by any player". The word "accepted" matters. If the opponent prefers to play on, perhaps to keep practising, perhaps to try for a century, they may. The conceding player's offer is then void, and the frame continues.
The physical gesture
Players often indicate a concession by touching the balls, sweeping a red off the table or offering a hand. The rules deal with that too. If a player touches or moves a ball to signal a concession, the referee will not call a foul if the concession is accepted. If it is not accepted, the rule on a ball intentionally moved applies instead, or the rule on a non-striker coming to the table, so the gesture is treated as an infringement and the balls are dealt with accordingly. Shaking hands across the table before the opponent has agreed is the one way to turn a concession into a penalty.
When a professional may concede a frame
The rule that matters most in the professional game is Section 4, Rule 2(b). A player shall not concede a frame in any game or match unless one of the players requires penalty points. A breach counts as unsporting conduct, and if the player has already been warned for that kind of conduct, the next frame is awarded to the opponent.
So the line in the professional game is exactly the line drawn by snookers required. Before it, a frame must be played out, however hopeless it looks: a player 70 behind with 75 on the table has to keep trying. After it, a concession is allowed. The rule exists to stop a player giving up frames early to save energy or time, or to get away from the table, which damages the match for the audience and for anyone with an interest in the result.
A second clause closes the loophole. Rule 2(d) says that if a player who does not yet require penalty points deliberately commits a foul so that they then do require them, that is also unsporting conduct, and the referee will issue a warning. A player cannot foul their way into a position where a concession becomes legal.
| Situation | May the frame be conceded? | Rule |
|---|---|---|
| Behind, but a clearance could still win | No; conceding is unsporting conduct | WPBSA Section 4 Rule 2(b) |
| Needs snookers | Yes; the opponent may refuse | Section 4 Rule 2(a) and (b) |
| Deliberately fouled to need snookers | Not without being warned for unsporting conduct | Section 4 Rule 2(d) |
| Aggregate-score match | Yes, but the opponent receives the value of every ball left | Section 4 Rule 2(f) |
| Only the black left, more than seven behind | Frame already over by claim or award | Section 2 Rule 1 |
Conventions above the rule
Professionals do not concede the moment they need snookers. The convention on the tour is to play on while the frame can realistically be won, and usually until the snookers required exceed what the position allows. A player needing one snooker with all the reds on the table will play on. A player needing four with two reds left and the colours on their spots will generally concede.
The decision also depends on the match position. A player who is 5-0 down in a best-of-nineteen will chase a frame they would concede at 5-5, because every frame is valuable when there are few left to give. Commentators who say a player "should have conceded" are usually forgetting that the player may be trying to deny the opponent rhythm as much as trying to win the frame.
Concession of a whole match is a separate thing, and rare. The best-known modern case is Ronnie O'Sullivan's walk-out against Stephen Hendry at the 2006 UK Championship in York. Trailing 4-1 in the quarter-final, and in the middle of a break in the sixth frame, he shook hands and left. He was fined and docked 900 ranking points for it.
Playing on: what is realistic and what is hope
The number of snookers is only half the picture. The other half is where the balls are.
A player needing two snookers with six reds left, several of them tight to cushions and the black on its spot, has a reasonable chance. Reds near cushions are hard to escape onto. The black on its spot provides a snookering ball in the middle of the table. Each foul is likely to be worth four, and with six reds on there is time to lay several.
The same player needing two snookers with only the colours left is in a different position. The yellow, green and brown are clustered at the baulk end, so a snooker on the yellow has to use the green or brown as cover, and both lie in open space. Escapes are easier. Each snooker is a fresh battle with less room to work in.
Signs a comeback is possible
- Several balls near cushions, which are harder to hit cleanly from a snooker.
- The black and pink still on their spots, providing cover in the middle of the table.
- An opponent who is tiring or has missed easy balls in the session.
- A free ball becoming likely, because the cue ball keeps finishing in awkward spots.
Signs it is not
Few reds and open colours. An opponent with a reputation for escaping snookers. A deficit that needs four or more fouls. Comebacks from needing several snookers do happen on the professional tour, and they are remembered precisely because they are unusual, but no official record of the largest is kept, and figures that circulate about specific frames should be treated with caution. This page does not repeat them.
The honest assessment at most levels is this: needing one snooker is a contest, needing two is possible, needing three is rare, and beyond that the player is playing for practice.
Formats where nobody concedes
In aggregate-score formats, every point scored in a frame carries into the match result as well as into the frame. Concession works differently there, and in many cases it makes little sense.
The rules address it directly. When aggregate scores decide the winner of a game or match and a frame is conceded, the opponent receives the value of any balls remaining on the table. Reds count as eight each, and any colour that is off the table incorrectly is counted as if it were on its spot. A player conceding a frame with five reds left therefore hands over 67 points: forty for the reds and 27 for the colours. Playing on, the opponent would almost certainly score fewer.
So in aggregate formats, players needing snookers almost always play on. Every ball potted adds to their own aggregate, and every ball they keep off the opponent's total helps the team or the match result.
League frames and points
Many English county and district leagues use aggregate points as a tie-break between teams, or as the result itself in some divisions. In those leagues a frame that is "lost" still contributes to the match. A player 60 points behind may never win the frame but can reduce the team's deficit by potting the remaining reds.
Handicap competitions add another layer. A player with a points start may need snookers on the scoreboard while still being well placed on the handicap. League handbooks usually explain how starts are applied, and a captain should know whether a concession is allowed and what it costs before a frame reaches that stage. Our overview of how a snooker frame is played and won covers the core rules that league handbooks build on.
Club etiquette when the frame has gone
Etiquette sits beside the rules and is enforced by reputation rather than referees. A few conventions are close to universal in English clubs.
Offer the concession at the table, not from your chair. Walk over, offer a hand, and let the opponent accept. Do not sweep the balls into the pockets until the opponent agrees, because a concession that is refused leaves the touched balls as a foul.
Never concede while the opponent is down on a shot. A player who has settled into a stance and is about to play does not want to be interrupted, and a concession offered at that moment is treated as gamesmanship. Wait until the stroke is complete and the balls have stopped.
How the next frame is set up
Once a concession is accepted, the balls are re-racked for the next frame. In most club games the loser of the frame racks the reds. In matches with a referee, the referee handles it. The order of breaking alternates, so the conceding player may be breaking off next, and a quick re-rack after a concession helps maintain the pace of a match.
At club level, playing on in a dead frame for practice is common and perfectly polite, so long as both players agree. A player needing three snookers who wants to keep going should ask, and an opponent who wants to finish the frame should simply say so. Clubs across England, and on the England sports guides hub, treat that sort of arrangement as normal sense rather than a rule: the frame belongs to both players.
The rule written by the WPBSA sets the minimum. The etiquette sets everything else.