Asif faces Bilal in National Snooker final

KARACHI: Second seed Muhammad Asif and third seed Muhammad Bilal advanced to the final of the Jubilee Insurance 43rd National Snooker Championship 2018 as they overpowered Muhammad Majid Ali and Babar Masih respectively in the semifinals here at the Karachi Gymkhana on Tuesday.

The two of the top ranked cueists of the country, hailing from the province of Punjab, will combat for the national crown on Wednesday (today) as the best of 15-frame title clash, due to commence at 10 am, will be followed by the prize distribution ceremony at 3.45 pm. Like both the semifinals, the final will also be telecast live on Geo Super.

In fact all the four semifinalists belonged to Punjab as the Sindh duo of Zulfiqar Abdul Qadir and Sultan Muhammad had crashed in the quarter-finals on Monday.

Neither of the two best of 11-frame semifinals could turn out to be a thriller. First Bilal floored eighth seed Babar 6-2 with the scores of 58-43, 54-25, 68-21, 36-62, 22-90, 81-46, 65-57, 75-21 and then Asif downed Majid Ali 6-3 with the scores of 111-16, 85-22, 78-23, 58-15, 35-47, 24-66, 33-77, 55-19, 69-5.

Not surprisingly the encounter between the two seeded cueists, Bilal and Babar, was played at a faster pace and it was over in two and a half hours.

The 32-year-old Bilal, coming from the town of Mandi Bahawaldin, lived up to his reputation of being a prolific potter as he chalked a couple of stunning half-century breaks in successive breaks to go 3-0 up.

The 31-year-old Babar, one of the best cueists to have emerged from Rawalpindi, having looked supremely confident throughout the event, fought back gallantly to win a couple of frames but he was unable to stop his opponent from taking the next three frames which settled the issue.

The second semifinal was contested by the cueists of contrasting style as the 35-year-old Asif, a former world champion from Faisalabad, who cleaned his rival (Zulfiqar Qadir) in just 70 minutes in the quarter-finals the other day was up against the 24-year-old Majid, a resident of Samundari, who had taken more than six hours to edge out his quarter-final opponent (Sultan Muhammad).

Asif got off to a cracking start once more as he had done in the earlier matches. Firing breaks of 61 and 78 in successive frames he established 4-0 lead in commanding style.Unlike his earlier opponent, however, Majid proved a hard nut to crack and the obdurate youngster opened up the game by claiming three frames on a trot to narrow the deficit to just one frame.

Fresh with a fine break of 63 in the previous frame, the momentum was with Majid as he entered the arena for the eight frame with an eye on equalizing the match. But Asif played like a true champion and didn’t allow much liberties to his threatening rival. He snatched the initiative by pocketing the crucial frame to secure 5-3 lead and finished it off in the very next frame.