JOIN USThe Billiards and Snooker Federation of India unveiled the logo for the Seaways IBSF World Snooker Championship, set to kick off here on Wednesday, with its secretary S Balasubramaniam confident of pulling out another successful hosting story.
“India is hosting the event for a record fifth time and Bengaluru is staging it for a record third time,” said Balasubramaniam.
“For the first time we are hosting the event at a stadium but we are confident of putting up a good show. Bengaluru has always been the hub for cue sports and I’m confident people will embrace it again.”
BSFI president Capt PVK Mohan, whose company Seaways are the main title sponsors, said the brilliant achievements of his cueists prompted him to take up title sponsorship.
“Our cueists have done so well this year, winning plenty of medals. Pankaj Advani alone has won three individual world titles. I felt I needed to give them something in return.
“So we decided to come aboard as the main title sponsor. I’m confident an Indian will lift the title.”
Competition will be staged in three categories: men, women and masters.
IBSF board member Barrie Jones praised BSFI for hosting the event for the third time in five years. “BSFI deserves special credit for agreeging to host the event again. The last two times -- in Hyderabad (2009) and Bengaluru (2011) - BSFI pulled off a brilliant show. I’m confident of another successful staging."
Indian squad: Men: Pankaj Advani, Kamal Chawla, Brijesh Damani, Dharminder Lily, Faisal Khan, Sandeep Gulati, Laxman Rawat, Shivam Arora, Manan Chandra, Sourav Kothari, Asuthosh Pandey, Varun Madan, Rupesh Shah, Sahil Nayyar, Nitesh Madan, Divya Sharma, Rahul Sachdev, Shahbaaz Adil Khan, Lucky Vatnani, Shyam Jagtiani.
Ladies: Vidya Pillai, Chitra Magimairaj, Amee Kamani, Neeta Sanghvi, R Umadevi Nagaraj, Neena Praveen, Arantxa Sanchez, Meenal Thakur, Suniti Damani, Varsha Sanjeev, Judy Walia. Masters: Alok Kumar, Nadeem Ahmed, K Vankatesham, Farhad Tengra, BVS Murthy, KS Naveen, Rafath Habib, SA Saleem, Nadeem Azeez, Prem Prakash, Kamaraj SH, Amar Chawla.