In league the other day I had this one game that stands out in my mind as a well thought out plan of attack. I had four balls left with the 8 ball tied up by one of my opponents balls, I was solids and my opponent was stripes. 

I had ball in hand so I started with the 4 ball as shown in the diagram above.  Playing a little bottom I left myself mostly a straight in shot on the 3 ball allowing me to draw back for a straight in shot on the 5 ball.  Keeping in mind I needed a little bit of an angle on the 6 to try to get the break out of the 8 ball I played a stop shot on the 5 ball.  I decided to play the six ball with slow to medium speed with about 2 o'clock english. In the diagram you can see the dotted line that shows the path that the cue ball took off of the six.  I ended up hitting it perfectly and the cue ball came off the rail and nudged the 9 ball out of my way to leave myself an easy shot on the 8 ball. My final shot is shown in the below diagram.

It felt good to put together a plan of attack for my remaining balls and see it come together exactly how I planned it. One saying that has really become a part of my game lately is if you do not know where the cue ball is going to go then you are not ready to shoot it. Consistency is key when it comes to pool and I am always working on being more consistent. 

Till next time I will be “Forever Learning the Art of Pool”