The Hindu : Sport / Billiards & Snooker : Aditya Mehta enters final

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Wednesday, May 25, 2005

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Sport - Billiards & Snooker

Aditya Mehta enters final

Special Correspondent

Aditya Mehta outplayed Manan Chandra in the semifinals. — Photo: S.R. Raghunathan

Chennai: India junior No. 2 Aditya Mehta of Maharashtra outplayed Delhi's Manan Chandra 100-23, 79-8, 83-18, 75-14, 69-20 in the semifinals of the MCC invitation snooker tournament at the MCC premises here on Tuesday.

It was a clash between two talented youngsters who vie for the No. 1 spot at the world level. Manan has gained himself a name with some excellent performances. But on Tuesday he was nowhere in the picture as Aditya played superbly. Such was his control and potting that the Maharashtra boy had a 90 per cent strike rate in the match.

After the match Aditya said, "This is my best performance so far. This was my third meeting with Manan and we had a 1-1 record. Now I have a 2-1 lead. I always play well against Manan."

In fact, Aditya finished fourth in the senior Nationals. "I lost to Pankaj for the third place match in the last Nationals," he said.

It was an excellent start by Aditya. Initially Manan gave him chances and he seized the opportunity and recorded a well-compiled break of 78 in the first frame. He went on to record a 50 in the second, 63 in the third and 50 in the fourth. Aditya was cool and potted the balls with tremendous confidence. He quickly ran up a 4-0 lead and Manan gave up.

Other results:

Quarterfinals: Alok Kumar (ONGC, Punjab) bt Rafath Habib (SRSA) 88(55)-7, 2-116 (63), 63-31, 58-70, 66-8, 93 (62)-12, 5-84, 61-37; Pankaj Advani (Bangalore) bt Antim Singh (SRSA) 14-51, 75-10, 80-1, 85-0, 22-61 (60), 83 (76)-2, 61-53; Manan Chandra (Delh) bt S.A. Saleem (MCC) 107 (57, 48)-15, 47-48, 56-43, 64-27, 70-57, 19-75, 43-60, 58-4; Aditya Mehta bt Siddharth Rao 1-79, 84-68, 66-23, 92-42, 16-80, 62-59, 96 (50)-8.

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