Uttar Pradesh State Ranking Billiards & Snooker Tournament 2008

22 September 2008 - Allahabad

I.S. Malik - CSI Correspondent

Defending champion, Raghoo Sinha of the hosts, Allahabad, fresh from his experience of the IBSF World billiards championship where he was one of the participants from the country, began his campaign in great style even as he avenged the defeat which he had to face during the State ranking billiards meet held in Meerut in August against Moradabad’s veteran cueist, Mohammad Naeem. Raghoo won the one hour Group "A" league match by 340 -146 points.

Starting off well, Raghoo struck useful breaks of 57, 47 and 42 points in the process of winning his match with consummate ease. Naeem was not upto the mark on this day managing only on noteworthy break of 46 points.

Nishit Prakash of Meerut won a close contest against Rahul Kapoor of Moradabad by a mere 6 points in the one hour tie which saw a neck and neck fight till the very end. Nishit keeping his cool eventually won the Group "B" match by 196-190 points.

Subodh Lahiri of Ghaziabad playing as a wild card entrant and coming to big time competition after a decade tried his very best to match the Aligarh champion, Manish Behl  but fell short of the target even though towards the end of the one hour tie he seemed to be coming to terms with the run of the balls. Manish played consistently and adequately to come out on top with a 188-136 points victory over his rival in the Group “ D “ encounter.

Anuj Bhargava of Lucknow in a group "C" meanwhile was charting his own course against Agra’s Nikhil . Using his strong potting to advantage, Anuj was right on top from the very start and had no difficulty in winning the one hour match by 201-92 points.