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National Billiards & Snooker Championship
The Kotla Vijaya Bhaskar Reddy Indoor Stadium
Yousuf Guda - Hyderabad
:: Report - 08.12.2007 ::
by CSI Correspondent
Isthmit Singh Malik
Even as the 2007 National billiards championship began here with an air of hope and expectation at the Vijaya Bhaskar Reddy Indoor Stadium at Yusufguda with the inaugural speeches of the Chief Guest, the Speaker of the AP Assembly and legendary Geet Sethi, it was the young Keerat Bhandal, the 10 year old diminutive girl cueist from Delhi and the oldest lady competitor, Chandra Babu from Tamilnadu who held the centrestage.
Keerat was all promise and enthusiasm while Babu was poise and grace as they went with their motions on the green baize in a hall which not only boasted of 14 newly laid out Wiraka billiards tables but a sporting ambience which would be tough to match.
Keerat was immaculate in her red pot from the spot in the process of her two to one games victory over AakanshaSingh showing promise of the greater things to come in a couple of years although her stint was shortlived as the defending champion Meenal Thakur of Maharashtra knocked her out in straight games to enter the quarter finals in the ladies section. Joining her was Vidya Pillai of Tamnil Nadu who had to sweat it out against Ashwini Puranik of Madhya Pradesh. Vidya with her crisp and neat potting of the cherry eventually won by two games to one.Reigning World Billiards LadiesChampion, the ebbulient, Chitra Maghimairaj wasirrepressible while posting a straight games win over West Bengal's, Neeta Kothari. Chitrawas never in any trouble but complained about the slow throw of the cushions probably due to a slightly warmer atmospheric condition prevailing in the evening compared to the cooler morning session.
R. UmaDevi of Karnatka was the other lady to make the last eight stage at the expense of Priyanka Agarwal winning in straight games without much a ado. This was all in evidence in the evening session. Earlier, in the morning matches, Heena Khandelwal of Maharashtra was too good for the elegant Soumini Srinivas of Tamilnadu winning in straight games whereas Anuja Chandra of Petroleum Sports Promotion Board outplayed Shivani Agarwal of Delhi. The Delhi lassfinding the going a bit too tough since the snooker parlour player as Anuja exhibited great cue ball control on her way to an easy victory.
Kamala Chandra Babu showing the glimpses of her old touch which had brought her the LadiesNational crown in 1991almost spoilt her party when Mandeep Kaur of Karnatka threatened to surprise her by wresting the second game to level up at 1-1 but in the decider, the Veteran was equal to the task as she reached the winning post.Shivani Agarwal meanwhile in the opening tie of the championship managed to get the better of young Estar Bueala of the hosts AndhraPradesh in three well fought out games. Renu Barkatiyaof MP got past Indira Gowda in three games while the graceful Heena Khandelwal had to struggle to overcome the young Bengal lass, Suniti Damani in three games.
Raunak Wazirani was the star performer of Friday among the Sub - Junior billiards players notching up a fluent 267-135 points victory in a one-hour game which augurswell for him for the later games.Dwaj Haria was very impressive in his win over Himanshu Jain aggregating a huge 281 pointsto his rival's not too bad score of 160 pointsin a single hour.
In the Qualifying section of the Senior Billiards which also was played on the day, the people to impresswere Govindraj Reddy,Mohammad Akram Khan, Shyam Jagtiani, Aditya Agarwal, and Mohammad aseem but the one cueist who stole the limelight was local hope but a Railway player, S. Simachalam who wassimply unstoppable playing a sound all round of the table game while outclassing Delhi's, Vivek Pathak by 628- 247 points.