In most parts of the world, snooker is one of the most-watched sports on television. You don’t need to have any specialist knowledge of the sport to sit down and watch a game of snooker. Even if you’re not sure which color order the balls have to be potted in, the commentators will explain things to you as you go along. Someone who’s never watched a single game of snooker before in their lives can easily find themselves totally absorbed by a game within twenty minutes of switching it on. That’s why so many of us grow up as fans of the sport.

Unlike cricket or soccer, where participation is mostly limited only to those who have a natural talent for the sport, almost anybody can play snooker. So long as there's a venue near you that allows access and you can afford to hire a table for a while, you can learn to play snooker either with friends or on your own and work at your own pace. Like many young Pakistani men who grew up watching snooker on television, Mohammad Ikram fell in love with the game as a viewer and then found a table to play on so he could participate. He dreams of playing in big-name competitions all over the world. There's just one difference between Mohammad and the average snooker player - Mohammad doesn’t have any arms.

For the overwhelming majority of people, not having any arms would be a barrier to a snooker career. Mohammad doesn't believe that to be the case for him. He was born without arms, and so he's been adapting to situations where arms or hands would usually be required for his entire life. Instead of playing with a cue, Mohammad strikes the cue ball with his chin - a feat that he can pull off with incredible accuracy and surprising power. He started learning to play this way as a child, and he's now 32 years old. After years of experimentation and practice, he can now direct any ball toward any pocket with just as much accuracy as someone with a chalked piece of wood in their hands. As we can clearly see in this video from the BBC, he can get a stunning amount of movement out of the smallest twist or turn of his jaw or neck. Now videos like this one have started to go viral across the world, he’s beginning to receive a lot of attention.

It's probably not a surprise that it was the BBC who created the video of Mohammad and turned it into a feature. Nowhere in the world is snooker loved more than it is in the United Kingdom, where it's served as the inspiration for many a video game and online slots attraction as well as filling television schedules for hours at a time. Ronnie O'Sullivan - arguably the greatest individual snooker player of all time - is English. Sullivan is a huge celebrity in his home country, and even his own personalized game at online slots websites to go with all his other accolades. Our focus on online slots here is because, generally speaking, snooker is heavily connected to gambling. That isn't the case for Mohammad Ikram. He's never played or even heard of any snooker-themed gambling games or Playtech slots because they're illegal in Pakistan. He loves snooker purely for the sport, and that love might soon bring him greater rewards.

Finding a place to play and practice wasn't easy for Mohammad. The nearest snooker club to the rural Punjab province he grew up in is twelve miles away in Samundri. Mohammad started going there more than ten years ago, and before long, he was making the whole journey there and back on foot every day to sharpen his skills. His unusual appearance and surprising abilities quickly started to get him noticed, and that attention grew more and more as he began to win games and trophies. He's won three regional tournaments in Pakistan but believes that he's capable of playing for bigger prizes in front of larger audiences. If he can beat the best that his region of Pakistan has to offer, he might be able to beat players from elsewhere in Pakistan, too - and if he can beat them, he might be able to beat players internationally.

Mohammad's aims are simple ones. He says he'd like to bring joy to people, win international praise for Pakistan, and gain the approval of Imran Khan. To be more specific, he's hoping that Imran Khan or other people within the Pakistani government might support or sponsor his attempts to perform at international snooker tournaments. The recent viral video of him will surely help in that endeavor, but the complicated rules of World Championship snooker tournaments make it difficult to determine whether he'd be able to follow his dream. The rules make it very clear that a cue has to be used to strike the ball. No exception currently exists within those rules to allow for someone who doesn't have the ability to strike the ball with a cue. Rules are made to be broken, but the sport's governing body's willingness to make exceptions for one (as yet) unknown and unproven player might not be great enough for it to happen.

The theoretical debate over whether Mohammad Ikram would be allowed to play tournament snooker in the United Kingdom or elsewhere can wait for another day. Before he can get to that point, he has to defeat the biggest and best players in Pakistan to boost himself up the rankings. Even then, he might run into issues with the rules. The sport doesn't know how to deal with people like Mohammad for the simple reason that it's never come across people like Mohammad before. Most people, faced with such a disadvantage, would never consider trying to find a way to play snooker in the first place. Even if they did work out that they could strike the cue ball with their chin, it's doubtful than anybody other than Mohammad would stick at it for so long that they'd one day be good enough to defeat able-bodied players. Every time he steps up to a table, he's making history. Now his story has been heard across the world, and we hope that someone steps up to back him and give it the happy ending it deserves.