Ahmedabad: the Commonwealth tables are finally busy
Afternoon all. This morning I promised you Ahmedabad results at lunchtime, and I have to be straight with you first: there aren't any scores to give you yet. The first full day of the Commonwealth Cue Sports Championships has been going since 06:00 BST at the Veer Savarkar Sports Complex. The organisers' own schedule now has the early heyball, blackball and 10-ball matches marked as completed. What it doesn't have is a single score. The snooker entries haven't been updated at all, even the ones that started six hours ago. So you'll get the line-ups and the times, and I'm not going to guess at who won.
The snooker last 16 is spread across four sessions. All times are BST:
- 06:00: Dhvaj Haria v Chris Dagnall, and Darren Morgan v Bryan Lim Meng Liang. In the women's event, Rebecca Kenna v Chandihila Mbangiwa and Michelle Rabe v Laura Griffiths.
- 08:30: Craig MacGillivray v Lim Kok Leong, and Laxman Rawat v David Wright.
- 11:00: Alex Borg v Mohamed Thaha Irshath, and Ketan Chawla v Michael Curphey.
- 13:30: Aditya Mehta v Jason Williams, and Ross Vallance v Reagan Low Chew Tung.
The one I'll be watching is Mehta. He's one of the best-known names in India's men's snooker squad, a former main-tour player who's now playing in front of his own crowd, and he goes on at 13:30, just after this goes up. Lim Kok Leong, whom PTI named among the visiting stars this week, was due on at 08:30 against MacGillivray.
English billiards has its first round today too, and there's a lot of India in it. Siddharth Parikh played Clive Marsh at 06:00, and Anupama Ramchandran played Chimba Chimfwembe. Rayaan Razmi plays Kevin Augusta from 11:00, and Mohamed Mubeen Mansoor plays Darren Clark at 13:30. Michael Pearson v Jonathan Marwood was on at 08:30.
A heyball rematch, and a man from Guernsey
The best pairing on paper was in the women's heyball last 16 this morning. Vidya Pillai, the defending champion, was drawn against Marina Jacobs. When I wrote about the home squad yesterday, using the federation's squad list as carried by IANS, Pillai had won last year's final in Mauritius against Jacobs on a shootout. So this was a rematch of that final, played in the first round. The schedule says it's finished but doesn't say who won. Kelly Fisher's heyball match against Vaishnavi Jugnarain is also marked completed.
In the 10-ball, James Kirk played Mark Foster at 08:30. Kirk is flying the Guernsey flag for the second year running. Back in August he told the Guernsey Press: "It's the pride, and it all just steps up a level." He was honest about how hard it is for islanders, too: "When you play international sport, because we don't have federations, we very much have to go the long route to our success — just because of opportunity." I hope it went his way. In blackball, Lee Shepherd played India's Aarav Sancheti, and Emma Cunningham was on early as well. Pooja Galundia v Mary Talbot in the heyball is one of the last matches of the day, at 13:30.
The quarter-finals and semi-finals are on Friday, and the medal matches are on Saturday. When the scores do appear, the evening roundup will have them.
Goyang: the kid against the five-time champion
Over to Korea. You met Lee Seung-hee this morning: she's 16, the youngest player on the LPBA tour, and she was due to play Lee Mi-rae at 07:00 BST. More detail on how she got there has come out since. Money Today and Ilgan Sports both describe her last-32 shootout against Baek Min-ju, a former champion. Baek took the first set 11–6 with a run of six. Lee won the next two, 11–8 and 11–5. Baek pulled level by winning a 22-inning fourth set 11–7. In the shootout neither player scored in the first inning, and Baek missed again at the start of the second. That left it to Lee, who made a back-around shot to win.
That was her fourth win of the week. She came through from the qualifying round, beating Lee Jae-hyun, Lim Jung-sook, Kim Jung-mi and then Baek. She passed the tryout in April after about a year of practice, and she reached the last 64 at the second tour event of the season. Money Today calls her opponent "five-time winner" Lee Mi-rae, so a lot was stacked against her.
I don't have the result yet. As I write, none of the Korean outlets I trust have reported the afternoon session. That includes Lee v Lee, Kim Ga-young's first meeting with Kang Yu-jin, and Hida Orie v Kim Jin-a. I'd rather wait than pass on a scoreline I can't stand behind. You'll have them tonight.
The evening session is on right now, at 12:00 BST. The pick of it is Park Jung-hyun, who won the last tour event, against Lee Shin-young, a former women's three-cushion world champion. Billiards & Sports points out that they met in the last 32 of the season opener, and Park won 3–1. Park came through her last-32 match 3–0 against Song Min-ji, with three bank shots in the third inning of the second set. Han Ji-eun, who averaged 1.737 in beating Kim Se-yeon 3–0, plays Yong Hyun-ji for the first time. Yong only got through after a shootout with Seo Yu-ri.
Goseong: Cho beat his father on the way to the doubles title
We gave you Cho Myung-woo's three-cushion doubles win with Park Hyung-bin last night. Billiards & Sports added one detail that I didn't have then. In the last 64, Cho and Park were drawn against Cho's own father, Cho Ji-eon, who was playing with Kim Hoe-seung. Father and son had won the Incheon Mayor's Cup doubles together in July. This time the son won 25–21 in 22 innings. Cho and Park also had a high run of 12 between them in the semi-final.
The singles, in three-cushion and pocket, started on Thursday, and Cho is going for back-to-back titles. I haven't seen any singles results yet.
Snooker round-up: Changsha, Riyadh, Sydney
- Changsha: The Snooker 900 breakthrough rounds go from 224 players to 112 today, and from 112 to 56 on Friday. I've looked again and I still can't find a reliable set of results, so I'm not naming anyone. The eight invited players, whom we listed last night, go straight into the last 64.
- Riyadh: The Kingdom Snooker Championship last 16 is at 15:00 and 18:30 BST. Saudi Cup winner Omar Al-Ajlani plays Osama Abbas Ammar in the later session, according to CueScore.
- Sydney: The last 128 of the Q Tour Asia-Pacific Australian Open at Mounties is almost done. WPBSA SnookerScores has the last match ending around 12:10 BST. There were a few tight ones: Deepak Bala beat Frank Mezzasalma 4–3, Tristan Lau beat Russell Coe 4–3, Mario Laus edged Aaron Donaghy 4–3, and Jason Perry beat Tylah Smith 4–3.
Around the rest of the map
- Bristol, Tennessee: I still haven't found any results from the WPBA Borderline Brunswick/Pechauer Invitational ($20,000 added), which runs until Sunday.
- Manila: The Reyes Cup starts a week today at the Makati Coliseum. Team Asia is Carlo Biado, Robbie Capito, Duong Quoc Hoang, AJ Manas and the 17-year-old Albert Januarta. The Rest of the World has Joshua Filler, Shane Van Boening, Francisco Sánchez Ruiz, Fedor Gorst and Aleksa Pecelj. Asia are going for a third title in a row.
- China: Wu Yize's CBL quarter-final with Zhejiang Jiuding carries on in Hangzhou. His singles is on Friday.
Where to watch / What's next
- Ahmedabad (today): the last snooker session is at 13:30 BST, with Mehta v Williams and Vallance v Low. The quarter-finals and semis are on Friday and the medal matches on Saturday. The organisers stream on their YouTube channel.
- Goyang (now): the LPBA evening last 16 started at 12:00 BST, on BilliardsTV. The PBA last 64 continues.
- Riyadh (today): the last 16 is at 15:00 and 18:30 BST. The quarter-finals are on Friday at 15:00 BST.
- Changsha (Fri): the round of 112 is played, and the last-64 draw is at 12:30 BST.
- Reading (Fri–Sun): World Seniors Tour event three, with scores on WPBSA SnookerScores.
- Hangzhou (Fri): Wu Yize's CBL singles is at 12:35 BST.
- Manila (15–18 Oct): the Reyes Cup, live on WNT TV.
Here's my question for you. Lee Seung-hee has gone from first picking up a cue to the last 16 of a pro event in about 20 months. Is that a sign of how good she is, or of how open the women's game still is at that level? Let me know below.
— Reggie Rutherford
Sources: Commonwealth Cue Sports Championships official schedule, IANS, PTI, Guernsey Press, Billiards & Sports (Korea), Money Today, Ilgan Sports, Edaily, MK Billiards, NetEase, CueScore, WPBSA SnookerScores, WPBSA, AzBilliards, World Nineball Tour, Chinese Billiards and Snooker Association.
Feature image: “Aditya Mehta at Snooker German Masters (Martin Rulsch) 2014-01-29 01” by Martin Rulsch, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
