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Tribune News Network
Doha
India's Pankaj Advani, Mike Russell of England, Singapore's Peter Gilchrist and Nay Thway of Myanmar advanced into the quarter-finals of the 150-Up format of the 2017 World Billiards Championships at the Indoor Dall of the Al Arabi Sports Club in Doha on Friday.
Other players to qualify for the knockout stage include Dhvaj Haria, Dhruv Sitwala, Rupesh Shah, Siddharth Parikh, Sourav Kothari and Brijesh Damani from Indian; Robert Hall (England) and Aung Htay (Myanmar)
Russell and Gilchrist played last two matches of their respective groups of round robin stage where Russell won both.
Gilchrist, meanwhile, won the first match against Sitwala but lost to Chit Ko Ko of Myanmar.
Russell was down by one game and 103 points when Rupesh gave a chance, which Russell converted into the game winning break of 148 points. Starting up from there, he showed excellence of top-table floating white game of billiards.
Though he missed on 97 in next game, which Rupesh capitalised with a break of 104, but again he came up with another brilliant break of 151 points to set a decider.
In the decider, Russell countered Rupesh's lead of 81 points with a break of 96 points but when he reached on 145, missed a cannon.
The gap was wide and soon he got another chance to clear-up remaining 5 points and secure his win.
His second match of the day gave him straight 3-0 win against Aiden Murray of Ireland. Russell scored three consecutive breaks of 138, 108 and 136 to stay group topper and obtained second seed for the knockouts.
Multiple-time world champion Gilchrist had a mixed day. The morning session match he won against former Asian Champion Sitwala 3-2 but couldn't save his next match where Chit Ko Ko of Myanmar defeated him 3-2.
The match was interesting as Chit Ko Ko required to win 3-0 to qualify for knockout stage, but failed to save two games, which doesn't allow him to enter last-12.
Though Gilchrist lost that match but it doesn't affect his qualification as third seed.
The fourth seed Nay Thway Oo also performed exceptionally well with his win over former Asian Champion Kothari 3-2.
After losing first game, he took the charge and made a comeback with two worthy breaks of 90 and 116 to take lead of 2 games to 1. Even in fourth game he scored a break off 96 points but Sourav countered him well with small and effective break of 54 points to set decider.
In the decider, Nay Thway Oo posted two breaks of 69 and 50 points to confirm his fourth-seed place.

Results (150-Up)
Peter Gilchrist (Singapore) bts Dhruv Sitwala (India) 3-2
Mike Russell (England) bts Rupesh Shah (India) 3-2
Ihab al Salih (Iraq) bts Abdulkarim Maksoud (Syria) 3-0
Siddharth Parikh (India) bts Steve Mifsud (Australia) 3-0
Aidan Murray (Ireland) bts Yazan Alhadad (Syria) 3-0
Robert Hall (England) bts Khamis al Obaidli (Qatar) 3-0
Pankaj Advani (India) bts Brijesh Damani (India) 3-0
Chit Ko Ko (Myanmar) bts Peter Gilchrist (Singapore) 3-2
Aung Htay (Myanmar) bts Abdulkarim Maksoud (Syria) 3-0
Dhvaj Haria (India) bts Yazan Alhadad (Syria) 3-0
Dhruv Sitwala (India) bts Khamis al Obaidli (Qatar) 3-0
Nay Thway Oo (Myanmar) bts Sourav Kothari (India) 3-2
Brijesh Damani (India) bts Ihab al Salih (Iraq) 3-0
Mike Russell (England) bts Aidan Murray (Ireland) 3-0
Siddharth Parikh (India) bts Aung Htay (Myanmar) 4-2
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11/11/2017
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