Sethi in fine fettle, Bhaskar in last eight

Dhruv Sitwala, Rupesh Shah storm into quarterfinals of World Professional Billiards meet

Sethi, aiming his sixth world professional title, hardly broke his sweat to beat Kreuziger 1247-185 in his Group D second league match with brilliant breaks of 56, 69, 238, 84, 221, 63, 248, 75. He, however, will have to beat compatriot and IBSF World billiards champion Pankaj Advani on Saturday to book a quarterfinal berth.

Sethi’s three compatriots -- Dhruv Sitwala, B Bhaskar and Rupesh Shah -- made it to the quarterfinals. Sitwala, runner-up in the recently concluded Yorkshire Billiards Open Classic at Bradford, scored an effortless win over England’s Robert Hall 1010-228 in his first game before defeating Advani 731-495.

Advani, placed in the same group as Sethi and Sitwala, kept his hopes of a quarterfinal berth alive by overwhelming Kreuziger 1169-159 in his second game of the day. The winner of Saturday’s game between Sethi and Advani will make it to the quarterfinal.

Only two players from each group will qualify for the quarterfinals. Kreuziger and Hall are already out of contention with both losing all the three games they had played so far.

In Group C, India’s B Bhaskar also made it to the last eight with a comfortable win over Gary Rogers 529-295 even though he lost his second game of the day to England’s Martin Goodwill 400-567. With an all win record from three games, Goodwill made it to the last eight. India’s Saurav Kothari from the same group is out of the contention. In Group A, title favourite Russell is sitting pretty on the points table by winning all his three games. Russell defeated India’s Devender Joshi 703-439 in his only match of the day. Joshi is out of the tournament with a win and two losses. From the same group, Rupesh Shah made it to the last eight defeating compatriot Joshi 485-309 and England’s Ian Williamson 480-249.