There are two techniques in putting English on the cue ball. One is the regular kind that you normally see being done by majority of pool players, including the Pros. The other is the kind whose execution you do not see, and which is used by most Filipino masters of the game. I’d like to call it "Carabao English".
With the regular english application, imagine the cue ball resting on an ice skate. The skate will mark a line wherever the cue ball travels on the table. Then imagine two parallel lines at both edges of the Cue Ball sandwiching the skate mark. Now you have a road with lane paint in the middle. With this technique, you have to have your entire cue stick on either side of the road, parallel to all the imaginary lines you have drawn on the green.
Carabao English is harder to learn because it requires more imagination and calculation. You will be surprised that many international players do not even know how to speak Carabao English. Put an object ball a foot away from a pocket. Line up the cue ball and the object ball along a straight shot to a distance of one inch left off a pocket. Aim your stick at the skate (dead center). If you release the cue without English, the object ball will land one inch to the left of the pocket. But if, as you release your cue, you move your shooting arm so your cue tip will hit the cue ball at a spot quarter of the cue ball to the left, you will make that shot. The wider the cue tip goes, the wider the angle will be reacted on by the object ball. Carabao English produces a more exaggerated reaction to the both the cue and the object balls.
The Carabao English technique tells us two things. One is that if you do not have a straight swing, your object ball will most likely take a tour around the table. Also, as long as there is a clean line to the center of the object ball, it is not yet the end of the world for you.
