Qatar’s Abdulla al-Tamimi sneaked into the quarter-finals of the squash tournament at the Asian Games but not before being taken the full distance by his Kuwaiti rival, who incidentally shares his surname.

Abdulla, considered one of the rising stars from Qatar with several regional-level titles to his credit at the junior level, finally prevailed over Ammar al-Tamimi 11-9, 5-11, 12-14, 12-10, 11-7.

With precious little to choose from between the two players, the match became a battle of nerves, especially after the Kuwaiti won the second and third sets after losing the first. Abdulla, however, produced a fine comeback and kept his cool during the big points to edge out Ammar. “It was a tough win but in the end I somehow managed to pull through,” said Abdulla, a product of Qatar’s renowned Aspire Academy. “The match could have gone either way and in the end it boiled down to who would make fewer mistakes and I am happy I prevailed,” Abdulla added.

The Qatari will now take on Hong Kong’s Lee Ho Yin today’s quarter-finals. “It could be another tough match but it’s only a question of winning one match now to make the semi-finals and I am feeling confident,” he said.

Meanwhile, in shooting, Qatar’s Rashid al-Athba was entertaining hopes of making the main draw of the Men’s Trap competition after finishing in 10th position overall following three qualifying rounds yesterday.

Al-Athba shot 23-25-23 for a total of 71 out of 75 targets and with two more rounds to go can hope to be among the top eight in order to qualify. Al-Athba’s compatriots Mohamed Ali Khejaim and Mohamed al-Rumaihi, however fared poorly, shooting 67 and 62 out of 75 targets and are languishing in 25th and 41st place respectively.

Qatar’s women shooters failed to make an impact with Nasra Mohamed, Aldana Mubarak and Hanadi Salem crashing out in the 10m Air Pistol qualifiers. Nasra finished 42nd with a score of 362, while Aldana and Hanadi finished 45th and 46th, shooting 358 and 357 respectively. China’s Zhang Meng Yuan later went on to win the gold medal in the competition.

Meanwhile, Qatar’s beach volleyball team comprising Abdelaziz Khallof and Tamer Abdul Rasool drubbed the Maldives duo of Adhil Ibrahim and Adnan Abdul Hameed 21-13, 21-7.  Qatar, however, had a day to forget in tennis with their men suffering a 3-0 blowout to Pakistan in the men’s team competition. First Abid Mohamed defeated Mohamed al-Mutawa 6-2, 6-7, 6-3 and then Aqeel Khan edged Shanan Zayed 6-0, 4-6, 6-1. Abid Mohamed and Aqeel Khan then combined well to thrash Ali al-Sayegh and Mubarak Zayed 6-1, 6-4.