Experienced Asif downs Zulfiqar to clinch snooker trophy

KARACHI: Former world champion Mohammad Asif cashed in on the inexperience of Zulfiqar Abdul Qadir to win the final of the Jubilee Insurance 3rd Ranking Cup Snooker Championship 2017 at the Karachi Gymkhana on Friday.

The 35-year-old Asif, hailing from Faisalabad, won 10th national ranking title of his career by overpowering the 31-year-old Zulfiqar, from Karachi, who was playing in his maiden final of any national tournament, 8-5 with the frame scores of 47-80, 64-47, 71-58, 9-71, 101-5, 54-45, 45-52, 76-74, 57-10, 143-0, 10-61, 41-72, 62-51.

The unseeded Zulfiqar extended his brilliant form which had brought him in the final against all odds. But he ran out of luck in the title clash and went down fighting after having come up with yet another brilliant performance.

The local cueist got off to winning start with the help of a break of 52 but he lost the next couple of frames after being in a commanding position. He bounced back to take the fourth frame to make it 2-all.

Through a fantastic break of 101, Asif broke the shackles in the fifth frame and he was fortunate to narrowly win the fiercely fought sixth frame to move 4-2 up. Zulfiqar reduced the deficit by winning the seventh frame but he surrendered another close frame to slip 3-5 down.

The former world champion made the most of the lapses of his inexperienced opponent in the following frames and comfortably won the next couple of frames to go 7-3 up by the interval. His sensational break of 143 in the 10th frame put him just one frame away from yet another trophy.

Zulfiqar showed great resilience after resumption and opened up the game by pocketing two successive frames to make it 5-7. He got chances of turning it to 6-7 but it turned out to be 8-5 instead to the relief of his fancied rival.

Asif collected cash prize of Rs70,000 along with the winners’ trophy from Tahir Ahmed, Managing Director, Jubilee General Insurance Ltd, while Zulfiqar received Rs40,000 with the runner-up trophy.

Asif bagged another reward of Rs5,000 for the highest break of the championship of 143. There were cash prizes of Rs15,000 each for the losing semi-finalists Asjad Iqbal and Mohammad Bilal. The losing quarter-finalists Babar Masih, Mubashir Raza, Ahsan Javaid and Khurram Hussain Agha had to be content with Rs5,000 each.

The former world champion, in a brief chat after winning the trophy, admitted that he was able to take liberties against Zulfiqar in the final due to the latter’s inexperience. Asif praised Zulfiqar for maintaining the consistency which enabled him to reach the final after toppling quite a few higher ranked cueists.

Zulfiqar, having the ambition of representing the country in international competitions, vowed to carry his good form into the next national events. “Since I was not among the seeded cueists before the start of this event I am unsure if I will be able to jump to the second slot in the national rankings on the basis of this performance. But I aim to continue working hard to secure a position among the top cueists of the country,” he said.