NJI to sponsor first-ever 6-Reds Snooker in December

Syed Khalid Mahmood

New Jubilee Insurance (NJI), the major sponsors of cue sports in the country, will also support the Pakistan Billiards & Snooker Association (PBSA) in holding the first-ever 6-Reds National Snooker Tournament later this year.

Alamgir Anwar Shaikh, President, PBSA, has announced that the inaugural 6-Reds National Tournament, to be sponsored by NJI, will be held in December.

“We had been working on this for quite sometime and finally it has been decided to launch the event this year. The growing popularity of 6-Reds version of the game has prompted this move as we desire to have our cueists well versed with this format as well,” the PBSA President remarked.

“We are in the process of finalizing the number of participants for the inaugural tourney. We are yet to decide whether to limit to the participation to the top eight of the country or let the top 16 contest it in view of providing exposure to a larger pool of cueists,” Alamgir Shaikh added.

The PBSA President reckoned that the 6-Reds format designed to revive the popularity of snooker as a spectator sport, in the same way Twenty20 has done to cricket was here to stay.

He acknowledged the support of the sponsors over the years, having helped enormously in taking snooker to its present level in Pakistan.

NJI has emerged as the lead sponsors of the Pakistan snooker after the withdrawal of Lakson Tobacco Company, whose brand Red & White remained famously associated with snooker for over a decade.

The 6-Reds snooker has gained immense popularity over a short period of time and this television friendly format is likely to stay here for a long time. The PBSA has acted in the right direction by introducing it at the national level and there are possibilities of taking to the provinces as well.

The six-red snooker, also called six-reds, 6-red, and super 6s, is a cue sport based on snooker but with only six red balls on the table as opposed to the standard fifteen. All other rules are unchanged and the table is also of the same size as in the traditional 15-red game. The format was designed to feature shorter frames, due to fewer red balls.

The first international tournament in this format was contested in July 2008. A six-red tournament was held during the 2009 World Snooker Championship as a sideshow, involving one-frame knockout matches. The first 6-Reds World Championship was held in Ireland in December 2009.

Meanwhile, the first-ever edition of 6-Reds Snooker Men’s State Ranking Tournament in India, was organized by the Karnataka State Billiards Association (KSBA) in Bangalore last month.

A total of 97 entries were received and the matches were played on a knockout basis to decide the top 16, who then formed four leagues to compete for quarter finals.

The top two cueists were selected represent the state in the forthcoming 6-Red Snooker Nationals to be staged in Chandigarh from September 17 to 25.

Unhearlded Shahid crowned as Pakistan’s new national snooker champion

By Syed Khalid Mahmood

Mohammad Shahid, a qualifier from Punjab, stunned everyone by whipping top seeded Imran Shahzad in the final of the NJI 36th National Snooker Championship 2011 at the Banquet Hall of Karachi Gymkhana on February 10 to be crowned as Pakistan’s new national snooker champion.

The prize distribution ceremony, which was also being telecast live, started at the scheduled time of 6 pm as the best of 15-frame final lasted less than five hours. The match could have easily gone for another three hours if it went to the full distance of 15 frames.

Tahir Ahmed, Managing Director, New Jubilee Insurance, who was the chief guest of the evening, presented a cheque of Rs 60,000 to Shahid alongwith the glittering trophy while Imran had to be content with a purse of Rs 35,000.

Shahid, the man of the moment, also shared the prize for the highest break as he recorded one of 97 in the final which equaled the feat of second seed Sohail Shahzad earlier in the competition.

In his brief speech on the occasion Tahir Ahmed expressed his delight at the emergence of brilliant youngsters from every nook and corner of the country, hoping that the launch of Under-14 and Under-17 events would be even more beneficial in discovering the raw relent.

Alamgir Anwar Shaikh, President, Pakistan Billiards & Snooker Association (PBSA), delivered the welcome address in the closing ceremony in which he acknowledged the support of all the stake-holders, making a special of the extensive media coverage.

The simple but graceful ceremony, which didn’t go beyond half an hour, was also attended by Ali Rahim, President, Karachi Gymkhana and other club officials including Amin Noor, Jahangir Moghul, Fawad Malik and Mian Azmat Hussain.

The 28-year-old Shahid, making his first-ever appearance in the final of any national ranking event, shattered Imran’s dream of winning the national crown. It was for the third time when the 35-year-old had crashed in the final of the National Championship.

The rub of the green went Shahid’s way most of the time and the Faisalabad youngster grabbed the opportunity with both hands to outclass his fancied opponent from Lahore 8-2 with the frame scores of 44-90, 97-4, 70-7, 82-1, 86-0, 80-32, 40-78, 81-42, 66-24, 67-44.

Imran had got off to business-like start by claiming the opening frame but Shahid made his intentions very clear with a massive break of 97 in the very next frame. He went into the lead by claiming the third frame and didn’t look back.

The breaks of 61, 86 and 61 during the next three frames put him in a commanding 5-1 lead, Imran halted his opponent by pocketing the seventh frame but Shahid proved too good again in the next three frames to fulfill his ambition of becoming the national champion.

The confidence with which Shahid played in his maiden appearance in the final was awesome as he was not afraid to go for the toughest of shots. Imran also stayed positive throughout but he was just not good enough on the day.

Shahid was thrilled with his maiden title win, conceding that he did feel the pressure of the live coverage in the semifinals when he had let his opponent, Sultan Mohammad take away three frames on a trot after having won the first four.

“Yes I was playing in front of the camera for the first time which did affect me and I was a bit uncomfortable when Sultan dragged me into playing slowly. It was a different ball game in the final because Imran, like me, was playing aggressively,” he added.

NJI offer greater support to Pakistan snooker

By Syed Khalid Mahmood

Tahir Ahmed, Managing Director, New Jubilee Insurance (NJI), has offered to sponsor an international snooker tournament this year, besides taking care of a series of national events.

“We have also requested the Pakistan Billiards & Snooker Association (PBSA to look into the possibilities of launching a tournament at the national level for Under-15 or Under-17 which we are prepared to support. We believe that the youngsters hold the key to the future of the country and special efforts must be made to facilitate them,” he observed during a media briefing at the Karachi Gymkhana on January 26.

“As the major sponsors of snooker for the last few years, we take pride in having played our part in the development of cue sports. We are eager to see the game getting spread in every nook and corner of the country,” Tahir Ahmed explained.

Meanwhile the PBSA has decided to organize the NJI 36th National Snooker Championship 2011 from January 31 instead of the NJI 4th National Junior (Under-21) Championship 2011.

The announcement was made by the PBSA President, Alamgir Anwar Shaikh, during the media briefing soon after getting the approval of the NJI Managing Director sitting next to him.

“After getting the nod of the sponsors right away we have decided to hold the National Championship from January 31 instead of the National Junior Championship which will now be organized at a later date,” Alamgir Shaikh announced.

Originally the media briefing was to be done for the NJI 4th National Junior (Under-21) Championship 2011 which was to be held at the Karachi Gymkhana from January 31 to February 5.

“The National Championship will start from January 31 but it will go on till February 6. 32 cueists will be featuring in the Nationals with four from each province making it to the final draw with the top 16 of the last ranking chart,” the PBSA President revealed.

“The prizemoney of the National Championship will be higher than that of the National Junior Championship in which a total of Rs 120,000 was to be at stake. We are trying to have a bigger purse for the winners as well as the runners-up,” he added.

“Another incentive for the winner of the upcoming National Championship will be qualification in the Asian Championship to be held in Indore, India, in April. Since Mohammad Sajjad is an automatic qualifier by virtue of being the last year’s runner-up we will be entitled to three entries this time,” Alamgir Shaikh said.

Ali Rahim, President, Karachi Gymkhana, also assured the support for the promotion of snooker. The Gymkhana’s newly elected convenors, Jahangir Moghul, Amin Noor and Saleem Yousuf were also present on the occasion.

The country’s premier cueist, Mohammad Sajjad, who will defend his title in the 36th NJI National Snooker Championship 2011, will be the favourite to win the title once more in the presence of a group of veterans and s crop of new talent.

According to the draws of the championship, released by the PBSA, Imran Shahzad has been placed in the Group A alongwith Rambail Gul, Shah Khan and Abdul Rahman while the Group B comprises of Sohail Shahzad, Noman Awan, Arshad Siddiq and Zahoor Ahmed.

The quartet of Mohammad Asif Toba, Sultan Mohammad, Hamidullah and Kamran-ur-Rahman constitute the Group C while the Group D features Mohammad Shahzad, Mohammad Javed, Yasir Shahzad and Abid Hussain.

The Group E contains Asjad Iqbal, Umair Alam, Raja Rashid and Faisal Kashmiri while the Group F is composed of Imran Qamar, Qasim Kamani, Ayaz Khan and Mohammad Yousuf.

Shehram Changezi, Abdul Sattar, Mohammad Imran and Naveen Perwani have been drawn in the Group G while the quartet of Mohammad Asif, Sharjeel Mahmood, Mohammad Shahid and Khurram Hussain Agha form the Group H.