Geet Sethi, Alok Kumar recover in time to win

Chennai, Sep 13 (UNI) Former national champion Alok Kumar and veteran Geet Sethi came through their matches against Arvind Savur and M C Manoj 3-1, 3-2, respectively in the qualifying rounds for World Snooker Championship to be held in Austria in October.

Alok Kumar who showed his class by pocketing a sole red double to the centre pocket followed it up with a blue to that pocket. The red bunch was broken from the blue and he made a 65 break in the first frame against Arvind. Subsequently, he made a flawless 81 break against Kamaraj and won that match also. Kamaraj was down 0-2 against Alok Kumar. And with his grit equalled the frame score before losing the final frame to Alok Kumar.

Geeth Sethi had difficulty in potting in the match against M C Manoj in the first two frames. The frame score was 2-2 and in the deciding frame, Manoj was on a break leading by 24 points. But Manoj missed a sitter brown after potting the red and Geeth with his skill potted the yellow and a difficult green to come to brown. The legend then showed his class going on to pot the blue and the pink and defeated Manoj.

The final round of the qualifiers will be plyaed tomorrow, following which an eight member team would be picked.

SCORES: Group A: Alok Kumar bt Arvind Saur 3 - 1 65-15, 01-75, 79-33, 77-44 S A Saleem bt Kamaraj 3 - 0 54-65, 62-35, 81-45 Alok Kumar bt Kamaraj 3 - 2 97-05, 74-09, 38-63, 50-53, 64-8 S A Saleem bt Arvind Savur 3 - 1 61-19, 36-62, 83-17, 69-17 Group B: Geeth Sethi bt Raj Mohan 3 - 0 53-40, 78-01, 77-23 M C Manoj bt M K Harinarayanan 3 - 2 67-49, 57-62, 59-68, 71-21, 58-28 Geeth Sethi bt M C Manoj 3 - 2 37-57, 50-66, 61-16, 72-45, 52-57 Harinarayanan bt Raj Mohan 3 - 1 46-49, 61-42, 65-15, 66-31.

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