Pakistan win second straight team final against India

For the second straight team final in a matter of five days at the Qatar Billiards and Snooker Federation Academy Hall, Pakistan triumphed over India, this time winning the second edition of the IBSF World Team Cup snooker yesterday.On Friday, Zulfiqar Qadir and Babar Masih had won the Asian Team Snooker Championship beating India’s Pankaj Advani and Laxman Rawat 3-2 in a thrilling final. Yesterday, Mohamed Bilal and Asjad Iqbal beat the Advani-Rawat combine 3-1 for the winners’ cheque of $10,000.“We were runners-up last year, and this time we managed to win it. It’s a huge achievement and a gift for our Pakistan. Thank God for this win,” Bilal told Gulf Times after the victory.“It’s an India-Pakistan final and you know how important this is. There is always pressure for this game. But we were determined that we will put the name of our country up there and thank God we were able to do it.”Yesterday, Bilal opened well against the 21-time world champion Advani, who had won his first Asian snooker title on this trip to Doha, taking the frame 64-11. “The first frame is always tough, and also the most important one. That’s the one that sets the momentum and once I pulled that one, I was hopeful that we will be able to win this,” Bilal said. In the second frame, Iqbal’s 68-point break against Rawat gave Pakistan a 2-0 lead going into the doubles.However, Rawat and Advani managed to pull the doubles frame, something that had sparked their revival in the first edition of the tournament last year when Advani had partnered with Manan Chandra against Masih and Mohamed Asif. In fact, in the Asian final on Friday too, India had rallied back to force the fifth frame in the final after winning the doubles and the next singles frame, leveling the tie 2-2.Yesterday, the script, despite a few nail-biting moments, went differently with Iqbal surviving fouls against Advani to eventually win the final to the chants of “Pakistan Zindabad” from the small audience. “Asjad may have been a little wayward in the last frame but we had every one’s prayers with us and Alhamdulillah we won,” Bilal said.Having fought back in the last year’s final and then almost going the distance a few days ago, Advani was a tad philosophical post the defeat.“Every day is not a Sunday. You can’t always pull off a miraculous win. We were happy with the way we played throughout, obviously wanted to have a better game today and make it a closer one. Single-frame formats are always tricky. One frame anybody can win, then there is doubles, and you sit out for a while, and then back to a single frame, so there is never really any rhythm. And then 2-0 down, we woke up too late. If we had taken even one frame from the first two, we would have been in with a chance. Sometimes it just doesn’t work for you. I fought in the last frame but it doesn’t work sometimes,” the 33-year-old from Bengaluru said yesterday.Rawat said, “I tried something different and handed an open table to him in my first frame, I shouldn’t have done that. But I thought we played well throughout the tournament and had a chance of winning the trophy. But a bad day.”Personally for Advani though, the trip to Doha was fruitful. “To be honest, it’s been a great trip. I have played three finals in the last three weeks. To win the Asian snooker title for me is something that is been elusive. I have played four finals but never won it. So I am glad I set that record straight. It was the only trophy that was missing from my cabinet,” he said.The tournament was also a great one for Qatari players after Ahmed Saif and Mohsen Bukshaisha put up a fantastic show reaching the semi-finals of the tournament.“We thank God for this. That was the best result in the team event for Qatar ever,” International Billiards and Snooker Federation (IBSF) president Mubarak al-Khayarin said yesterday.“It was not an easy championship. I hope in the future Qatar players will also reach the final, or at least the semi-final. All the players tried really hard over the course of these tournaments, but the luck did not work in their favour. But in this tournament, Qatar beat China 3-2 after being down 2-1. They are one of the best teams in the world.”Talking about the organisation of the tournaments by the Qatar Billiards and Snooker Federation (QBSF), Asian Confederation of Billiard Sports (ACBS) and IBSF, he said, “We organised four tournaments 1 Asian men’s, Asian 6Red and Team, and the IBSF World Team Cup. I don’t think it is easy to pull this off. Also, all the teams have been happy because they didn’t have to incur extra costs since all these tournaments were happening here back-to-back.”