Meenal shows Judith the door

Title-holder Farah Khan (Karnataka) defeated state-mate Uma Devi 3-2. In the other match, Varsha Mazumdar of Maharastra lost to state-mate Heena Khandelwal in straight frames 3-0. Twenty-year-old Meenal Bairagi had earlier upset younger sister Anuja Thakur 65-14, 44-33 in the pre-quarterfinals at the KSBA Hall. Anuja was the favourite with her form so far in the tournament justifying that billing.

She was expected to run through Meenal’s challenge but as it out turned, it was Meenal whocalled the shots. Anuja struggled with her potting as well as positioning. The spotlight focussed on her adding to the nerves, Anuja looked rather demoralised, even as Meenal came up with consistent, compact and calculative breaks to win the first frame at 65-14, a score-line which reflected Anuja’s difficulties to get into her rhythm.

The second frame saw the sisters stay neck and neck, while clearing the reds, Anuja’s potting improved by a shade. Going into the colours, with a 24-28 deficit staring at her, Meenal came up with her best to pot all the colours till the pink (leaving the black insignificant) to pocket the frame at 44-33 and with it the match.

Call it early morning blues or starting trouble, Farah Khan did struggle to get into her wonten rhythm against Ashwini Puranik. Farah looked so desperate and dejected that she even committed a couple of fouls to donate points to her rival.

It was only a fortuitous pot on the black that gave Farah the first frame at 48-39, but a 1-0 lead did a gooddeal to boost the defending champion’s morale. In the second frame, Farah gave no room or hope for her opponent rival to plan any coup by potting and pocketing the frame in style.

Results — Women’s snooker (pre-quarterfinals): R Umadevi (Kar) bt Usha Khandelwal (Mah) 49-35, 66-21; Farah Khan (Kar) bt Ashwini Puranik (MP) 48-39, 63-32; Pooja Galundia (Raj) bt Jagruti Patel (Mah) 62-42, 69-46; Neeta Sanghvi (Mah) bt Chitra Magimairaj (Kar) 79-29, 52-21; Meenal Bairagi (Mah) bt Anuja Thakur (Mah) 65-14, 44-33; Heena Khandelwal (Mah) bt Kamala Chandra Babu (TN) 56-32, 62-47; Judith Walia (Kar) bt Sangeeta Hemchand (Mah) 58-36, 41-22; Varsha Mazumdar (Mah) bt Ritu Srivastava (MP) 59-18, 58-30.

Senior men’s billiards qualifying rounds (II round): Ashok Shandilya (Rlys) bt D Bhuvaneshwaran (TN) 896-324; Simhachalam (Rlys) bt Amit Khan Saheb (Mah) 541-471; SA Faheem (TN) w/o Mukesh Rehani (Del); Arun Agarwal (Mah) bt Satish Chhabria (Kar) 889-337.