KARACHI: Mohammad Fahim will confront Abdul Rahim in the all-Punjab final of the National Junior (Under-21) Snooker championship 2015 here at the Movenpick Hotel on Saturday (today).
Fahim and Rahim advanced to the final by beating Aamir Tariq and Nouman Iqbal, respectively, in the semi-finals on Friday.
Rahim was engaged in a tense eight-frame duel with Nouman Iqbal of Islamabad and downed him 5-3 with the scores of 77-9 33-59, 57-20, 59-66, 21-73, 60-28, 72-2 73-26.
Fahim showed excellent skills to overpower Aamir Tariq 5-2 with the frame scores of 22-60, 64-14, 50-24, 36-39, 65-55, 75-44, 61-43. The best-of-11-frame title clash will start at 12noon.
The 20-year-old Fahim, hailing from Sahiwal, who had crashed in the semi-finals last year, has more experience on his side than Rahim, who is an 18-year-old from Rawalpindi.
Both Fahim and Rahim will be making their maiden appearance in the final.
Majid Ali had captured the title last year by defeating Haris Nadeem in the final. Neither of them could enter the tournament this time having attained the age of 21.
As expected, the penultimate day of the tournament witnessed high-class snooker.
Rahim showed his class in the semi-finals, registering breaks of 61 and 66 in the first and the seventh frames, respectively.
Nouman had done well to move into 3-2 lead after five frames but he was unable to sustain the momentum and got eliminated.
Fahim was even more resilient in the process of taming the dangerous Aamir from Faislabad. He didn’t give much chance to his rival after being outclassed in the opening frame.
Earlier in the day, the cueists from Punjab dominated the quarter-finals with three of them going to the semi-finals.
Rahim chalked up breaks of 71 and 72 in successive frames to outwit Hassan Anwar of Islamabad 4-2 with the scores of 15-55, 35-48, 56-36, 54-42, 71-21, 90-10.
Fahim proved too good for Mohammad Afzal, also from Punjab, beating him 4-1 with
the frame scores of 24-60, 59-39, 61-21, 74-62, 59-55.
Aamir Tariq meted out similar treatment to Ali Zaman Khan of Sindh with the scores being 62-12, 60-24, 57-10, 45-63, 74-52.
Nouman became the sole cueist from the federal capital to make his way into the last-four when he outsmarted Mohammad Adil of Balochistan 4-1 with the frame scores of 53-68, 83-44, 52-34, 82-25, 70-1.