Home boy in fine fettle
Gilchrist bounces back after opening loss to Parikh to down Judge
Former champions Pankaj Advani and Peter Gilchrist had mixed fortunes on the opening day of the IBSF World Billiards championship at the Karnataka State Billiards Association, on Monday.
Playing at home, Bengaluru’s Advani, got off the mark right away winning both his opening day matches in fine fashion. First up for the 31year-old was countrymate Shankar Rao. Advani made short work of Rao defeating him by a whopping 389 points (500111) with a highest break of 208 and start the tournament in a convincing manner.
While the hot favourite wove his magic on the centre table, former champion Gilchrist wilted under pressure on the adjacent as he went down fighting to India’s Siddharth Parikh.
In a closely-fought contest Parikh had the last word pulling off the first upset of the tournament, defeating multiple time world champion Gilchrist 500-483.
Mumbai’s Parikh had the first century break of the match compiling 147 to grab the early lead. But true to his champion nature, Gilchrist fought back with two close century breaks. But the Indian held on and took advantage of the Singapore cueist’s slip-ups as he had the final say in the match.
Following the stunning victory, Parikh said, “This is the first time I have beaten him. Last year I lost to him in the semis in the time format and it was a quite a close game. He missed many shots. It was a patchy match. I just concentrated on the basics. I started with a break of 147. He had an off day so I punished him every time he missed Parikh.
The 36-year-old added that a big win like this, that too this early in the tournament would boost his confidence.
“It’s great confidence beating a multiple time world champion. Though the match itself was patchy the win gives me great confidence going ahead in the tournament. He was on 483 and I was on 445. From thereon he missed a canon and I went on to make an unfinished break of 55 to take the game.” a shot,” said