National 6-red snooker tourney starts in Bangalore

New Delhi: Ace cueist Pankaj Advani and Alok Kumar will vie for top honour in the inaugural National 6-Red Snooker Championship 2010 commenced in Bangalore on Sunday.

The nine-day event kicked off with the qualifying rounds at recently-renovated Karnataka State Billiards Association Hall. While reigning national snooker and billiards champion Advani, Saurav Kothari and Kamal Chawla were among 16 players to get direct entry to the main draw, 191 cueists will battle in the knockout qualification round for 64 available spots. Following the qualification rounds, the 64 players will be divided into the 16 groups -- featuring a seeded player in each of them. The direct entry were given on the basis of the previous National Snooker (15-red) performance. Among the seeded players are two-time national champion BV Srinivasa Murthy, IH Manudev, Dhruv Sitwala, Manan Chandra and Devendra Joshi. Two-time Asian Snooker champion Yasin Merchant and eight-time World Billiards champion Geet Sethi have pulled out of the event due to personal reasons. Advani, not seen in action since his semifinal appearance in the VIP Matrix All-India Invitational Snooker tournament in Chennai, is eyeing a good start in the new season and wants to put up some good performance before appearing in the selection trials for the 2010 Asian Games. “I hope to come out with some good performance in the 6-Red National Championship before appearing in the selection trials for the Asian Games in Guangzhou in China,” Advani said. “There are so many tournaments to look forward this year. I will try to put up good show,” he added. The rolling trophy to be won is named after OB Agarwal, the first Indian to win the IBSF World Billiards Championship in 1983, and will be sponsored by Om Agarwal Charitable Trust. In the season-opener, a set of interesting rules and an upgraded facility have been introduced to generate more interest among the fans. Ladies contenders have been divided into four groups of five each, with the top two qualifying for the quarterfinals. PTI