In a not-so-good start to his World Billiards Championship campaign, Indian ace Pankaj Advani lost his opening game against defending champion Peter Gilchrist but later made up with two straight wins, here.
Former champion Advani lost his way after winning the first two frames to go down 2-3 against the Singaporean ace in an interesting battle.
India’s poster boy of cue sports Advani, who has captured the title in the short and long format and has a total of eight billiards crowns under his belt, then ouplayed Adian Murray and Brain Harvey with a 3-0 scoreline respectively.
Former Asian Billiards champion Alok Kumar had a clinical day winning all his matches 3-0.
Ahmedabad cueist Dhvaj Haria also won all his matches, loosing only a frame.
All Indians in the fray cruised along with easy wins in the league stages and are half way through to qualifying for the last-32.
The World Championship, which started on October 20, has invited 55 entries from eight countries, 11 groups of five each.
Results:
Group A: D.Rajkumar beat Wayne Doyle 3—1, Beat Todd Hayward 3—2, Lost Aditya Agarwal 0—3. Aditya Agarwal lost to David Causier 1—3, Beat Todd Hayward 3—1.
Group B: Pankaj Advani lost to Peter Gilchrist 2—3, Beat Adian Murray 3—0, Beat Brain Harvey 3—0.
Group C: Jaiveer Dhingra beat Arthur Winn 3—0, Beat Shane Bartellete 3—0.
Group D: Dhvaj Haria beat Steve Brookshah 3—1, Beat Gaye Jones 3—0, Beat Berrard French 3—0.
Group E: Siddarth Parikh beat Phil Mumford 3—1, Beat Eddie Fielding 3—0.
Group F: V.Subramaniyam beat Adam Clark 3—0, Beat Jamie Barkar 3—0. Alok Kumar beat Jamie Barkar 3—0, Beat Adam Clark 3—0, Beat Peter Atkinson 3—0.
Group H: Dhruv Sitwala beat Jonathan Marwood 3—0, Beat Felix Knoll 3—0.
Group I: Rupesh Shah beat Carl Walter Steines 3—0, Beat Ross Doyle 3—0. Nalin Patel beat Carl Walter 3—0, Beat Ross Doyle 3—0, Beat Robin Wilson 3—1.
Group J: Sourav Kothari beat Steve Lock 3—0, Beat Devendra Joshi 3—2, Beat Stephen Kershaw 3—0. Devendra Joshi beat Steve Lock 3—0.
Group K: Ashok Shandilya beat Phil Davis 3—0, Beat Mark Hill 3—0, Arun Agarwal beat Phil Davis 3—0, Beat Sushrut Pandia 3—1.
