About This Game
Carrom is a popular indoor tabletop game that originated in South Asia. It is sometimes called "finger billiards" or "strike and pocket."
Equipment:
A square wooden board with four corner pockets (nets).
Small, circular wooden or plastic disks: 9 black, 9 white (or 9 each of two colors), and 1 red disk (the "queen").
A larger, heavier disk called the striker.
Players:
Can be played by 2 individuals (singles) or 4 players (doubles, partners sitting opposite each other).
Objective:
To use the striker to pocket all of your assigned color disks (black or white) before the opponent pockets theirs. The player or team to pocket all their disks first, along with the queen, wins the game.
Basic Rules:
Players take turns flicking the striker with one finger from the baseline.
On each turn, the player gets one strike (but can earn extra strikes for pocketing a disk).
The red queen must be pocketed with at least one of your own disks on the same turn (called "covering" the queen).
If a player pockets an opponent's disk, it counts as a foul. Fouls result in a penalty (returning one of your pocketed disks to the board).
Scoring:
After all disks of one color are pocketed, the player/team with all their disks plus the queen covered scores the opponent's remaining disks as points (each worth 1 point, queen worth 3 points). First to 25 or 29 points wins a match.
Carrom requires precision, strategy, and careful control of angles and rebounds, similar to billiards or shuffleboard.
Equipment:
A square wooden board with four corner pockets (nets).
Small, circular wooden or plastic disks: 9 black, 9 white (or 9 each of two colors), and 1 red disk (the "queen").
A larger, heavier disk called the striker.
Players:
Can be played by 2 individuals (singles) or 4 players (doubles, partners sitting opposite each other).
Objective:
To use the striker to pocket all of your assigned color disks (black or white) before the opponent pockets theirs. The player or team to pocket all their disks first, along with the queen, wins the game.
Basic Rules:
Players take turns flicking the striker with one finger from the baseline.
On each turn, the player gets one strike (but can earn extra strikes for pocketing a disk).
The red queen must be pocketed with at least one of your own disks on the same turn (called "covering" the queen).
If a player pockets an opponent's disk, it counts as a foul. Fouls result in a penalty (returning one of your pocketed disks to the board).
Scoring:
After all disks of one color are pocketed, the player/team with all their disks plus the queen covered scores the opponent's remaining disks as points (each worth 1 point, queen worth 3 points). First to 25 or 29 points wins a match.
Carrom requires precision, strategy, and careful control of angles and rebounds, similar to billiards or shuffleboard.