CCI Classic Invitation Billiards: Advani, Sitwala to lead Indian challenge; all eyes on Gilchrist

Mumbai, April 13 (IANS) Interesting and absorbing contests will be on cards as India's ace cueist Pankaj Advani, winner of 25 World titles, Dhruv Sitwala, the current Indian No. 2, Peter Gilchrist of Singapore, winner of multiple world titles and Rob Hall of England will be competing for the top honours in the Rs 10 lakh prize-money CCI Classic Invitation Billiards (time format) Championship, starting here on Friday.

Besides the four strong contenders, the other challengers from across the country include the defending champion Siddharth Parikh, former world champions Rupesh Shah, Sourav Kothari, Ashok Shandilya, Devendra Joshi and S. Srikrishna to name a few in the event organised by the Cricket Club of India (CCI) and to be played at the club's Sir Wilson Jones billiards hall from April 14 to 20, 2023.

The CCI events have proved to be quite successful for Advani who early this year won the CCI Classic Snooker crown defeating Englishman Stephen Lee in the final, will hope to maintain the winning momentum and add the billiards crown to his vast collections.

Meanwhile, Sitwala, who had late last year finished runner-up losing to Brijesh Damani in the national billiards finals, will be hoping to put up an improved showing and emerge champion.

The 55-year-old Gilchrist would be the man to beat. The lanky cueist won his first World Billiards Championship in 1994 in India and thereafter has collected eight more World titles, and is the firm favourite to finish with the top honours.

Meanwhile, the 39-year-old Englishman Hall, a 3-time World Championship finalist, boasts of having won nine English championships titles and almost 60 English ranking events and would hope to make this trip a memorable one by becoming champion.

At stake are a whopping championship winner's cheque of Rs 250,00 and a handsome trophy and a runner-up cheque of Rs 150,000 and a trophy. The losing semifinalist will receive Rs 75,000 each, the losing quarterfinalists will get Rs 40,000 each and the pre-quarterfinal losers will pocket Rs 15,000 each. The 16 players from the groups who fail to qualify for the knockout phase will take home a consolation prize of Rs 10,000 each. An award of Rs 50,000 will be presented to the player who constructs the highest break (500 points and over).

A total of 24 players have been seeded directly into the main draw and they will be joined by eight players who will come through after playing the knockout qualifying rounds on April 12 and 13.

The 32 players will then be divided into eight groups of four each and the top two players from each group will progress to the knockout pre-quarter-finals. The initial rounds will be played over a two-hour format.

The Groupings:

Group A: Pankaj Advani, Nalin Patel, Loukic Pathare, Qualifier

Group B: Peter Gilchrist, Ashok Shandilya, K. Venkatesham, Qualifier

Group C: Rob Hall, Rayaan Razmi, V. Subramanian, Qualifier

Group D: Dhruv Sitwala, Aditya Agrawal, Ishpreet Singh Chhada, Qualifier

Group E: Rupesh Shah, Devendra Joshi, Arun Agrawal, Qualifier

Group F: Siddharth Parikkh, Durga Prasad, Raajeev Sharma, Qualifier

Group G: Ketan Chawla, Dhvaj Haria, Mahesh Jagdale, Qualifier

Group H: Rohan Jambusaria, Sourav Kothari, Vishal Madan, Qualifier.