National Snooker championship: Billiards champion Advani eyes a double

“Winning the double is my goal, but snooker is a different ball game when compared to billiards. You can lose frames in snooker with fouls, misses, or an opponent’s fluke,” Advani said.

Pankaj Advani goes into the National Snooker championship as the defending champion.

All eyes will be on Pankaj Advani at the Senior National men’s snooker championship, which commences at KSBA here on Sunday. Advani – he won the National billiards title a few days ago - will claim a double if he wins the snooker event.

“Winning the double is my goal, but snooker is a different ball game when compared to billiards. You can lose frames in snooker with fouls, misses, or an opponent’s fluke,” Advani said.

The 20-time Senior National winner and defending champion will be tested by the likes of E. Pandurangaiah (2017 runner-up), Malkeet Singh, Sundeep Gulati and Laxman Rawat.

In the second round of the women’s billiards event, defending champion Amee Kamani took out Tamil Nadu’s Soumini Srinivas 51-39, 51-30.

The results: Women’s billiards:

Second round:  Amee Kamani (MP) bt Soumini Srinivas (TN) 51-39, 51-30; Keerath Bhandaal (Del) bt Indira Gowda (Kar) 51-18, 50-49; Vidya Pillai (Kar) bt P.S.S. Angel (AP) 50-29, 50-17; M. Chitra (Kar) bt Renu Barkatiya (MP) 52-0, 51-27; R. Umadevi Nagaraj (Kar) bt P. Keerthana (Kar) 50-33, 29-50, 50-19; Arantxa Sanchis (Mah) bt Neeta Kothari (WB) 50-32, 50-14; I. Lahari (Tel) bt Aradhana Naik (Kar) 51-38, 52-30; Varshaa Sanjeev (Kar) bt Ishika Shah (MP) 51-21, 10-50, 51-22.