The pool table at The Boot in King’s Cross

IT was once a cornerstone of the great British pub: three 10-piece coins to play, a slightly bent cue and an argument over whether it’s two shots on the black or not.

But a game of pool is no longer so easy to find in Camden.

On Saturday night, The Constitution in Camden Town re-opened after a four-year refurbishment but without the table where so many pots and pints had been shared.

It’s by no means the first pub to dispense with the chalk and slightly ragged green baize.

And it’s a trend that has left top players warning that the sport was in danger of becoming a “dying art”.

Landlords say changes to drinking culture have meant they need to focus more on food in so-called “dry-led” venues where dining table space is at a premium.

Now a handful of pubs in Camden have pool tables, including The Boot in King’s Cross, where landlady Sharon Winder said this week she had no intention of following the trend.

Ms Winder said: “I class my pub as a proper pub. And I think in any proper pub it’s important it has a pool table, a dart board and a juke box. We are the only pub around here now with a table.

“A pub should be a place to meet people, have a few drinks and a giggle. Pool brings people together who don’t know each other. You get women and men playing. All right, it can cause a lot of arguments, but not that many. I mean, it can be a bit rowdy sometimes, with people screaming and shouting.

“But once you see it isn’t scary, it’s all good, I think. Most people will say there are more positive vibes than negative. It’s win-win, if you ask me.”

Ms Winder said the old pub table operated the “silent contract” system of players putting down £1 on the side of the table to reserve their place in the queue.

She said she did try to gastro-up the pub when she took it over from her mother, but that it did not work out as she felt the venue lost its “soul”.

The pub has been run by her family for 31 years.

Shaz Khan says pool is competing with Playstations

Shaz Khan, who helps run the Chalk Farm Pool League, is the captain of the England pool team currently competing in the Nations Cup of Pool in Bridlington Spa, Yorkshire.

The 52 year-old said gentrification had a knock-on impact on pubs getting rid of tables and thinking more about the food they are offering.

He said: “Pubs have been around for donkeys years, and so have the pool tables. They are also a focal point of community. But with real estate the way it is, it’s not about bringing in the punters in the same old way anymore. The kind of pubs that are still keeping a table going are your friendly boozer types. Pubs have always been places for social gatherings. If that’s your thing, why not have a pool table?”

He added: “But if they keep taking them away like they are, it’s going to start affecting the game in a really serious way. How are you going to get the next generation of potential England players coming through?

“Another one of the big things is technology. The tech is only going to get better and better, and pool is competing now with PS5s for young people’s attentions. When I was a kid I used to go scrumping. Now there’s a gaming phenomenon that has taken over. Pool could become like a dying art.”

For decades, a frame or 10 of pool over a pint was a rite of passage for young people growing up in Camden.

Few landlords would dare to open a venue without a little nook reserved for a coin-operated table and range of often-bent and thick-tipped cues for rent behind the bar. But now just a handful of tables remain in pubs in Camden that are listed as still having pool tables.

These include Slattery’s, The Good Mixer, The Escape, The Boot, The Grafton, Sir Robert Peel, The Old Oak, The Cock Tavern and the Lord Stanley. Venues to lose popular pool tables include the Golden Lion and this week The Constitution, which is about to reopen after a major refurbishment.

Dave Murphy, who owns the Golden Lion, said he got rid of the pool before Covid in 2019.

He said: “We had a pool table for over 40 years. But I wanted to get serious about the food. The drinking culture has changed. You can’t be serious about food and have pool tables there. And to be honest the area has massively changed. The St Pancras campus has gone up there.

“It’s not the type of people coming in that I was worried about. I’d be the first man to have a game of pool if I went into a pub with a table. The problem was it was wiping out so much space, half the pub was lost basically if we had a table.”

He added that it wasn’t all doom and gloom. “I knew there would be alternatives in the area for people. Slattery’s, just up the road, has got a great little pool table and I drink up there myself. The wet-led pubs with the pool tables are actually benefiting because people seek them out, losing the tables elsewhere it actually enforces their business.”

Mr Murphy, whose family ran the Lion for decades, said he hired “Rack City Ribs” in the Lion in February that had been a massive success with people coming from all over London for a meal.