Indian Cueists Shine At The National Billiards And Snooker Championships

Legendary cueist Pankaj Advani and world no.2 Amee Kamani created history as they clinched both titles at the National Billiards and Snooker Championships. It was held at the PYC Hindu Gymkhana in Pune from 12 January to 2 February and Pankaj became the first Indian to win all three national championships of the green baize – 6Reds, Billiards and Snooker of Men category.

Although Advani and another legend, Geet Sethi have had the grand double of Billiards and Snooker multiple times, it is the first time that any Indian could achieve the ‘The Tremendous Triple’. Advani, who had won the National 6Reds earlier, clinched the National Billiards title on 24 January, beating Rupesh Shah of Gujarat 5-1 and lifted the National Snooker title on Thursday. After booking a final berth in snooker with a 5-2 win over Sandeep Gulati of Delhi, he thrashed E. Pandurangaiah, a player of the South Central Railways, 6-0 to win his 29th National title overall. He made his opponent look a mere spectator scoring breaks in every frame barring the second one. The final score was 6-0: 83(50)-1, 52-34, 76(75)-0, 65(64)-18, 82(50)-25, 79(78)-28 in favour of him.

On the other hand Amee Kamani defeated Arantxa Sanchis of Maharashtra 4-2 to win the National Snooker title and to come at par with Advani, to win all the three national titles of the cue sports in a row. She had lifted the 6Red title last month and went a step ahead of Meenal Thakur who was earlier the only Indian Women to hold the golden double of the National Billiards and Snooker titles.

( SOURCE : http://www.timechor.in/ )