SNOOKER – BAHRAIN’S Khalil Busaif claimed a hard-earned victory yesterday in his opening match of the men’s six-red competition in the IBSF World Snooker Championships 2025, currently being held in the kingdom.
Busaif edged past Pushpender Singh of India 4-3 (15-51, 40-20, 13-33, 46-7, 36-28, 22-36, 40-10) in a see-saw Group G contest at Crowne Plaza Bahrain on the second day of action in this division. He was the lone Bahraini to taste victory yesterday in this fast-paced format of snooker.
Elsewhere yesterday, Bahrain’s Jaafar Alraees lost to Chen Qien of China 2-4 (0-74, 29-36, 70-0, 35-26, 23-44, 7-55) in Group A, Abdulla Alaali lost to Ali Alobaidli of Qatar 0-4 (14-45, 5-42, 1-57, 21-38) in Group B, Mohamed Alshaikh lost to Fung Kwok Wai of Hong Kong 1-4 (1-38, 9-43, 6-36, 46-5, 21-38) in Group C, Hamed Dhaif lost to Amaan Iqbal of Scotland 0-4 (16-25, 2-31, 3-65, 21-47) in Group E, Habib Sabah lost to Asif Imran of Bangladesh 2-4 (23-32, 39-2, 17-35, 30-43, 68-0, 7-77) in Group J, Abdulla Mohammed lost to Paras Gupta of India 1-4 (15-43, 46-20, 9-39, 10-48, 6-60) in Group K, and Punait Saqer lost to Aditya Mehta of India 3-4 (34-20, 62-0, 23-35, 23-33, 21-30, 53-8, 16-42) in Group N.
Also yesterday, newly crowned masters world champion Muhammad Asif of Pakistan defeated Jay Chopra of Ireland 4-0 (66-0, 75-0, 54-8, 48-15) in Group N, and defending men’s six-red world champion Kamal Chawla of India beat Ali Hussein of Iraq 4-3 (37-26, 5-52, 71-0, 40-1, 6-48, 21-32, 33-23) in Group A.
Men’s six-red round-robin matches continue today at the same venue from 10am. The knockouts will begin from Tuesday and will be held until the worlds’ final day on Thursday.
Meanwhile, in the under-21 division, Bahrain’s cueists continue to hunt for their first victory after losing their matches yesterday.
Newly crowned under-17 world champion Muhammad Hasnain of Pakistan is also competing in this age-category. He has gotten off to a winning start, beating Ka Long Pang of Hong Kong 3-0 (71-22, 65-23, 65-54) in his first fixture in Group Q.
The under-21 preliminaries continue today with the knockouts scheduled for Tuesday to Thursday.
This year’s IBSF World Snooker Championships are being held under the patronage of Supreme Council for Youth and Sports first deputy chairman, General Sports Authority chairman, and Bahrain Olympic Committee president Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh
&uuid=(email))