Experience prevails over young fervour
- Written by Vivek Pathak - Media Officer, IBSF
Rupesh Shah - India
IBSF Media
Multiple time world champion Rupesh Shah faced a stiff competition in his first knockout match of last 32 stage from his compatriot and a player from his same club in India, Dhvaj Haria.
Shah started off well and soon pocketed first two games scoring decent breaks of 96 and 64 points when the Junior National Champion of India, Dhvaj made a comeback with a break of 90 points in response to 98 of Shah and pocketed the third game 150(98)-140(90).
Shah again pulled the next game crafting magnificent break of 147 points but further lost the next one where Dhvaj exhibited the breaks of 51 and 63 points.
Dhvaj was on the verge of making it 3-all and had crafted 97 points break in 6th game but missed the position couple of times ignoring Shah is much experienced and can turn down his chance any time. However, Shah did the same and gave good tutorial to Dhvaj on 'how to produced worthy breaks in such tense situations'.
Unlike that match, another Junior player from India Jaiveer Dhingra caused an early exit of B. Bhaskar. Credit must go to Jaiveer for using his skills well to pull first three games. He crafted brilliant breaks of 60, 122 and 88 points to gain 3-0 lead. However, Bhaskar made a comeback by winning 4th and 5th games but it was late as in next game Dhingra produced small but worthy breaks of 63 and 45 points to knockout Bhaskar at Last-32 stage.
The most exciting last 32 match remained of Ian Williamson and Phil Mumford that lasts for 6 hours 12 minutes. Entire match was a cliffhanger and ended in favour of Ian 4-3. Every game had a close finish but in the end it was Ian who marched ahead to Last 16 registering 6 points win over Phil in the decider.