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Amazing Advani achieves a double

Avinash Nair

Joshi’s heroics not enough to turn the tide in his favour

— Photo: K. Murali Kumar

CUP OF JOY: Pankaj Advani added the time format title to his collection with a splendid display.

BANGALORE: Pankaj Advani was prolific in the first session while Devendra Joshi was devastating in the next two. However, it was Advani who had the last laugh and achieved a rare ‘double’ yet again.

Advani, who first performed the double in Malta in 2005, capped 10 days of superlative play by adding the time format title to the points format crown in the ONGC IBSF World billiards championship here on Wednesday.

The KSBA hall wore a deserted look when the match commenced and even at the end of the first session, there were just around 100 spectators watching the summit clash. With the news of Advani on a roll spreading, more people started trooping in. And they were treated to a classic contest by Joshi as if on cue.

Candid

“The first session deficit was huge. Although I came back in the second with two triple hundreds and a 557 in the third (36th visit), Pankaj always came back with a century or two of his own. In fact, Pankaj’s 289 in the 31st and 253 in the very next took the match out of my reach” said Joshi quite candidly.

“His consistency and temperament is amazing” added Joshi. “From the very start he played admirably well.”

If Advani was spectacular, Joshi was no less, especially in the dying minutes. Sadly, that was not enough to turn the tide.

Geet Sethi, who lost the semifinals to Advani, had applauded the Bangalore cueist for his ability to raise his game on the big stage. On Wednesday, Advani did just that with some scintillating potting and terrific shot-making.

A 219 (third), 327 (seventh), 231 (10th) and 274 (15th) flowed from the 23-year-old champion with enviable precision.

For most of the first session, Joshi was left twiddling his thumb at the two simple errors Advani punished him for.

Bouncing back

The break before the second session seemed to have done wonders for Joshi. Trailing by 1123 points, he reeled off two successive 300-plus scores (338 & 364) to narrow the margin and a contest was on.

Advani came up with a fitting reply with a 289 in the 31st visit and had a lead of 779 going into the final two hours.

Advani soon came up with a 253 as the lead swelled to over 1,000 points once again.

However, Joshi was not through yet and produced a 557 in the 36th visit. If Joshi had gone to a 700-plus during that visit, he could have probably put Advani on the backfoot.

Instead, it was the latter who came up with a 100 in the 39th, a visit that was cut short by a bad miss on 1 ‘red’.

The crowd was on its feet when Joshi got into cruise mode and had a 208 and 103 in successive visits, but that did not prove sufficient to alter the final result.

Rewards

While Advani was richer by another $1,500, Joshi pocketed $700 for making it this far all the way from the qualifiers.

Advani also took home Rs. one lakh for each of the titles he won here, as announced by the Karnataka sports minister Sri Gulihatti D. Shekar.

The Karnataka Chief Minister, B.S. Yeddyurappa, gave away the prizes.

Geet Sethi, for his mammoth 885 in the league phase, won the prize for the highest break.

The result (final, six hours): Pankaj Advani (Ind) 2368 (219, 327, 231, 274, 65, 94, 289, 253, 100) bt Devendra Joshi (Ind) 2022 (76, 71, 338, 364, 557, 208, 103).

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