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National Billiards & Snooker Championship 2008 - Indore
Yeshwant Club
Race Course Road - Indore - 452 003 - Madhya Pradesh
29 November 2008
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Pankaj - Manan in Snooker Final
By I.S. Malik
Sourav Kothari, the young firebrand from Petroleum Sports Promotion Board and based in Kolkata began his semifinal match with his mate from PSPB based in Bengaluru and the reigning national snooker champion, Pankaj Kothari in style here on Saturday even as the 23 day competition entered the penultimate stage at the Yeshwant Club, Indore under the auspices of the Billiards & Snooker Federation of India taking the closely fought first frame but Pankaj rallied strongly to take a 3-1 stranglehold in the best of 9 frames.
When the semifinals began in the wonderful ambience of the specially created arena everyone expected that eventually the men's snooker final would be between the two leading protagonists of the 22 balls game of snooker and the inform cueists, Pankaj and Manan Chandra and so it turned out to be. Pankaj producing a break of 56 in the fourth to gain ascendancy not looking back as Sourav seemed to be trapped in a whirlpool of is own making.
The problem with Sourav is that he slows down the pace of the game in trying to spoil the pace of the opponent so much that he actually puts his own rhythm out of gear and that is exactly what happened in his match with Pankaj. Pankaj unmindful of these tactics or so it seemed not only foiled the game plan of Sourav but also set his own pace walloping the next three frames losing only the fifth on the run of the play to score an easy victory by 56-59, 82-08, 73-66, 103-00, 34-78, 85-00 and 81-07 points.
The second semifinal also went the similar way. Manan Chandra of PSPB who has been on a roll losing the first frame to Brijesh Damani the boy from Kolkata but coming back into his own from the second frame with a superb break of 85 to draw level. Brijesh who has shown a marked improvement in his game pocketed the third frame only to find Manan take the fourth restoring parity at 2-2. Again it was 3-3 after six frames due to some good safety tactics from Brijesh but Manan getting the better of the exchanges in the seventh forged ahead by 4-3 and then chalking up a break of 92 which was spell binding asserted supremacy. It was again a case of falling in your own trap for one can unsettle the strong opponent with these kind of stalling tactics but you cannot stop the flow of a class player and that is what actually happened. Manan eventually winning with a degree of comfort to set up a title clash with Pankaj for the coveted national snooker crown to be played on Sunday evening.
In the ladies quarter finals, Top seeded Vidya Pillai of Tamil Nadu had to struggle to override Meenal Thakur in five frame in a match lasting well over three and a half hours for a place in the semis with a 46-22, 16-58, 09-55, 48-16 and 54-30 points victory while in another long drawn out match lasting about four hours Tamil Nadu's Neena Praveen got the better of Sangeeta Hemchand of Maharashtra by 64-35, 16-56, 55-21, 23-63 and 13-70 points to make the last four grade of the women snooker competition.
In other one-sided quarter final matches Australian Open Ladies snooker champion, Chitra Magimairaj proving a bit too good for the lady from Maharashtra, Neeta Sanghvi beating her in straight three frames by 73-13, 55-53 and 62-27 points. In the second frame Neeta had a good chance but she floundered on the colours stage to give an opportunity to Chitra made no mistake by potting the vital black ball for the frame and then followed it up with the third frame with consummate ease to enter the semis. Anuja Chandra of he PSPB , a former national snooker champion was her usual confident and fluent self as she swept o a straight three frames victory by 53-12, 63-03 and 63-34 points to set up a match with Vidya in the semis while Chitra takes on Neena. Both matches will be played in the morning of Sunday while the ladies snooker final will be played alongwith the Men's snooker final in the early evening.