The Hindu : Sport / Billiards & Snooker : Stellar show by Advani

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Feb 26, 2006

Sport

Sport - Billiards & Snooker

Stellar show by Advani

Geet Sethi

Prestatyn (North Wales): Pankaj Advani, gaining in precision with every match cracked his first century of the tournament to announce his serious intentions of claiming this year's edition of the IBSF World snooker Grand Prix here at the Pontins Holiday Centre, venue for the world professional qualifiers and now IBSF's premier snooker event.

Alok Kumar and Aditya Mehta having faced one reversal each also won their encounters on Friday evening with ease making it three wins in four matches.

Pankaj Advani is clearly going from strength to strength in this event. On Friday he demonstrated his focus and commitment by uncorking a stellar performance to outclass Malta's Duncan Bezzina 4-1. Breaks of 50, 69 and 107 provided sufficient proof of the Bangalore based cueist's intentions and seriousness of purpose. With this win the 2003 World IBSF snooker champion has won all the four matches he has played so far and more significantly has given away only three frames which will aid him in getting a higher re-seeding when the knock-out draw is made at the conclusion of his nine league matches. Australia's Steve Mifsud heads the reseeding chart with the loss of only two frames in four matches.

Easy for Alok

Alok Kumar, India's 2005 National snooker champion disdainfully shrugged off a meek challenge provided by Bahrain's Mohammed Omar Ashiq as he cruised to an emphatic 4-0 victory. This bespectacled cueist whose greatest strength is his ability to rediscover peak concentration when he needs it the most, is still to discover the fluency and rhythm in his play. The fact that he has still managed to win three of the four matches played so far is a tribute to his talent and will to win. Aditya Mehtaedged out Risto Varynen of Finland 4-2. Like Kumar the stylish 20-year-old National junior snooker champion has won three of his four outings and is tied at 3-3 in his fifth outing against David Hogan of the Republic of Ireland.

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