Sethi wins a thriller against Bhaskar

BANGALORE, June 20: The match is not lost till it is won. That perhaps must have been the line, which ran in World No 2 Geet Sethi's mind a...

BANGALORE, June 20: The match is not lost till it is won. That perhaps must have been the line, which ran in World No 2 Geet Sethi’s mind as he came to the table with eight minutes left to compile an unfinished break of 174 to snatch his semifinal match away from the grasp of Karnataka’s B Bhaskar at the Titan PSI 2000 63rd Senior National Billiards and 21st Junior Billiards & Snooker Championships today.

With the 1379-1257 win, Sethi set up a title clash with Railways’ Ashok Shandilya, who won without having to sweat it out when his rival, Gujarat’s Sonic Multani, conceded the match 32 minutes into the game.

The 24-year-old Bhaskar held the lead for most part of the four-hour match, which was played without a break to ensure continuous television coverage. Bhaskar squandered a red on the top of the table with the scoreline reading 1257-1202 in his favour. This paved the way for Sethi to return to the table and make his most crucial break.

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Sethi had clawed from a 722-1070 position to go ahead 1184-1094 with breaks of 54 (27th visit), 212 (27th), 62 (28th), 123 (31st visit). But when Bhaskar came up with a 61 on his 32nd visit to narrow the lead to 1155-1186 and then potted a 76 three visits later to go ahead 1251-1202, it looked like the Karnataka No 1 might pull off an upset.

Sonic concedes match: If the billiard-buffs were charmed by the Bhaskar-Sethi semifinal, the manner in which the other semifinal between Ashok Shandilya and defending champion Sonic Multani went, left them disgusted.

Multani presented himself for the match 15 minutes behind schedule, which prompted referee Prakash Katrela to penalise him 100 points. Shandilya demanded a walk-over when Multani did not turn up in time, but seemed satisfied with the penalty points.

Shandilya came up with a break of 51 on his third visit and a 93 on the next. Multani threw in the towel complaining of stomach cramps. “I played four matches yesterday. Even today morning I’ve played for three hours. Now I cannot continue playing on an empty stomach,” Multani said as he signed the score-sheet, which stood at 252-2 in Ashok’s favour.

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Tournament Director CV Kapur clarified: “Multani’s quarterfinal match in the morning got over at 1.20 pm and the semifinal was scheduled to start only at 2 pm. I think there was ample time for Multani to finish his lunch. His accusation that there was not time to have lunch is baseless.”