SNOOKER – Bahrain’s Khalil Busaif powered through to the last 30 while Riley Powell of Wales and Aditya Mehta of India both punched their tickets to the top 16 yesterday in the men’s six-red competition of the IBSF World Snooker Championships 2025, currently being hosted by the kingdom.
Busaif emerged as the only national team player to make it into the knockouts after finishing first in Group G in the preliminary stage.
He closed out his schedule in the round-robin with a 4-2 (37-46, 52-10, 24-47, 46-15, 51-9, 47-0) victory over Hasanain Alsultani of the US. Busaif posted breaks of 36 and 42 in the fifth and sixth frames, respectively, en route to securing his win, which was his second in Group G. Busaif had also claimed a 4-3 win against Pushpender Singh of India in his first outing but then lost to Mohamed Shehab of the UAE 3-4 in the next. Shehab also advanced to the round of 30, which is scheduled to be played today.
There, Busaif will face Tomasz of Poland, while Shehab will go up against Paras Gupta of India.
Winners in the last 30 will join Riley and Mehta in the top 16. The pair qualified straight for this phase after finishing as the best two players from the preliminaries. Sixteen-year-old Powell won all three of his assignments to finish atop Group Q, as did Mehta in Group N.
Powell, who was the men’s under-17 world silver-medallist, was not in action yesterday having already completed his fixtures on Sunday. Mehta, on the other hand, beat newly crowned masters world champion Muhammad Asif of Pakistan 4-0 (39-28, 43-0, 50-5, 70-0). Asif also made it through to keep his bid for a title double in Bahrain alive.
Bahrain’s seven other national team players could not advance with Busaif, including Jaafar Alraees from Group A, Abdulla Alaali from Group B, Mohamed Alshaikh from Group C, Hamed Dhaif from Group E, Habib Sabah from Group J, Abdulla Mohammed from Group K, and Punait Saqer from Group N.
Also missing out was newly crowned men’s under-17 world champion Muhammad Hasnain of Pakistan. He was eliminated after losing to Ahmed Aseeri of Saudi Arabia yesterday 2-4 (32-33, 30-47, 55-30, 0-37, 44-18, 15-34) in Group H.
Amongst the other big names set to play in men’s six-red last 30 are defending champion Kamal Chawla of India and his countryman and men’s masters silver-medallist Brijesh Damani.
Meanwhile, Bahrain’s Abdulla Alaali made it through to the last 30 of the men’s under-21 division in this year’s world championships.
Alaali secured his place after finishing second in Group H. He won his last fixture yesterday against Chiu Chun Tung of Hong Kong 3-1 (27-58, 56-25, 55-18, 55-52) to punch his ticket to the knockouts.
Alaali joined Group H winner Max Handley of Australia in the next stage, where he will next take on Mayur Garg of India.
Despite losing in the men’s six-red competition, Hasnain still has a shot to play for another world title after finishing the under-21s as the top player from the opening stage. He is thus through to the last 16, where he is joined by Shaun Liu of Hong Kong as they await the rest of the field.
Hasnain won all three of his matches in Group Q with 3-0 score lines, capped by a 48-44, 79-29, 71-2 triumph over David Nistor of Romania yesterday. Liu was also unscathed in winning all three of his outings in Group D, which included a 3-0 (97-0, 93-21, 67-40) victory over Sebastian Milewski of Poland yesterday.
Also still in contention for the under-21 crown is Powell, who finished first in Group A and went through to the round of 30; while Bahrain’s other players all exited, including Hussain Aqeel from Group B, Faisal Almaliki from Group D, Salem Alazri from Group F, Mahmood Ahmed from Group J, Faisal Albasri from Group K, Abdulla Alhalwaki from Group L, and Abdulla Mohammed from Group P.
The last 30 matches in both the men’s six-red and men’s under-21 categories will be played today, setting the stage for the round of 16 tomorrow as well as the quarter-finals. The semi-finals and finals will then take place on Thursday.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh
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