17 September 2004	Friday	01 Shaban 1425

KARACHI, Sept 16: Naveen Perwani and Atiq Latif Bux made their entry into the final of the 18th Latif Masters Snooker championship, winning their respective matches in contrasting styles at the Karachi Club on Thursday.

Naveen in tremendous form steam rolled his way into the final with a 6-0 victory over Punjab's highly rated Abu Saim, which included two century breaks and one of 90.

Atiq on the other hand, having a great run this season, had to work harder in getting the better of NWFP's Rambel Gul 6-4, thus avenging an earlier defeat this year where he was beaten 7-6 by Rambel in the finals at the Karachi Gymkhana, with victory coming off the very last black ball.

Fourth seed Naveen began his campaign for the finals with a fluent break of 90 in the opening frame. Saim came back strongly in the next, chalking up 42 points and seemed heading to equalise the frame scores 1-1. Leading 56/25 with one red and the coloured balls to play for.

Although comfortably ahead Saim made several shocking errors, missing sitter blacks twice and three red balls. Naveen then potting red with brown and sinking all the coloured balls made a clearance of 32, which was enough to see him through to the second frame 57/56.

In arrears 0-2 Saim scored 15 points on is first visit in the third frame, only to see Naveen at his brilliant best clear the table with 106 points to register only the second century break of the tournament.

Continuing where he had left off in the third, Naveen had his hapless opponent on the ropes, chalking up another century clearance, this time of 134, and equalled the records of Farhan Mirza and Amit Parwani, who were the only two cueists to date to have chalked up two centuries in a match.

Farhan achieved this feat against Wahid Qadir, while Amit chalked up his two century breaks in four frames against Balochistan's Wajid Khan in 1999, which included 90 and 60 points on the trot in the other two frames.

Realising he was sinking fast trailing 0-4, Saim in a last desperate bid scored 42 points on his second visit to the table. But this was not enough. Scoring in bits and pieces on every visit to the table, Naveen raced ahead 5-0, winning the frame 70/42.

With dismay written all over is face, Saim hit up a quick 32 points, but another clearance from Naveen, this time of 32 points, sealed Abu's doom as he crashed out 6-0.

In the second semifinal, Rambel began the proceedings scoring 54 points on the trot to bag the opener 73/33. Leading comfortably in the second frame, Rambel was in for a shock with Atiq coming in from behind grabbed the frame 62/60, to level the scores 1-1.

In a sea saw tussle in the third, Rambel with two breaks of 32, took the lead again 2-1, beating Atiq 64/54, whose break of 35 was not enough to allow him to take over the lead.

Potting to the delight of the vast gathering, Rambel scored 88 points, after failing to sink an easy red in the centre pocket. In the doldrums trailing 1-3, Atiq returned the compliment with a stunning break of 84 and pocketing the next frame was now abreast 3-3 and breathing more easily.

Ramble still on the prowl never let this setback bother him. Scoring 36 points freely he went ahead 4-3, wrapping up the seventh frame 65/33. But Atiq still had plenty of fight left in him.

Firing 33 points on his third visit to the table, Atiq levelled the scores once again picking up the eighth frame 59/15 and much to the delight of is large band of supporters in the hall took over the lead for the very time by winning the ninth frame also 65/41.

A bit disappointed to see the game slipping away from his grasp, Rambel scoring 33 points on the trot was in front 55/28 with one red and the coloured balls still on the table.

Atiq taking his time, managed to pot a difficult red stuck to the cushion and stunning the brown, sunk the ball into the centre pocket. He followed it up with yellow, green and a cannon blue. Then taking his time in pindrop silence sunk pink and black and it was all was over in his favour bar the shouting.

This was Naveen's eleventh appearance in a final, twice in the Nationals and six times in the Latif Master's, including one International where he went down 8-6 to the Asian champion Ooi Chin Kay from Malaysia in the final.

For Atiq, at last displaying the talent of his late father, this was his second final in the four ranking tournaments held this year including a semi-final, where he was beaten by Mohammad Yousuf 6-5. An interesting final seems to be on the cards on Friday afternoon from 2-30 p.m., to be played in the best of 15 frames.

SEMIFINAL RESULTS: Naveen Perwani bt Abu Saim 6-0: 90-23, 57/32, 106/15, 134/0, 70/42, 68/32. Atiq Latif Bux bt Rambel Gul 33/73, 62/60, 54/64, 14/89, 84/0, 53/15, 33/65, 59/15, 65/41, 60/55.

FINAL TO BE PLAYED IN THE BEST OF 13 FRAMES. 2-30 p.m. Naveen Perwani v Atiq Latif Bux on Table No.3.