Dhruv,Pankaj,Geet advance in billiards

Earlier,Sourav Kothari (PSPB),playing with another mate of the same firm,Pankaj Advani,was providing excitement on the other table. Winning the first game he exerted his influence on the match but Pankaj,the recently crowned World Pro billiards champ was soon in his confident stride,pocketing the next three games as if nothing had happened. When Pankaj,the “Wonder boy of Indian billiards” gets into his rythm,then the three ball complex game of billiards appears to be very easy. Pankaj wrapped up the tussle by 103-151,151-21,150-94 and 151-148 points.

The billiards maestro,Geet Sethi from Gujarat was hardly in trouble against Shahbaz Khan of PSPB overwhelming him with a flurry of breaks. Playing in his inimitable classic style,the “cuesports icon” chalked up breaks of 92 in the first,105 in the second and breaks of 54 and 62 in the third to vanquish the hapless Shahbaz. Geet won 151-02,151-02,151-120.

Asian snooker doubles gold medallist,Rafath Habib of the Railways took his match to the wire before bowing out to former Asian champion,Devendra Joshi of PSPB by 2-3 games. Sharing the first two games with the “billiards touch artist” from Mumbai,Rafath using his strong potting to advantage,snatched the third game only to find Joshi restoring parity at 2-2. The decider was a tense duel of attrition,finally the purity of Joshi’s billiards game emerged at the top and the fighter from Chennai went down with dignity. Joshi won by 151-110,144-150,99-151,151-50 and 150-90 points to make the last eight grade along with Pankaj and Dhruv.

In the other matches,Alok Kumar of PSPB beat Shyam Jagtiani of the Railways by 152-59,118-150,152-108 and 150-142 points.

Former points format World champion Rupesh Shah of Gujarat emulated his state mate Geet when he drubbed veteran Shakeel Ahmed of West Bengal in straight games by 152-107,151-58 and 150-101 points to make the grade of last eight.

B Bhaskar,playing in superb touch coaxed and cajoled the balls at the top of the table for most part of the match to pulverize his statemate from Karnataka,D Rajkumar winning the tie in straight games at 150-00,150-125 and 150-12 points. Indian Railway star,Ashok Shandilya gave no chance to Manish Jain of West Bengal outplaying him in four games by 151-22,27-154,150-42 and 151-56 points.