KARACHI: Fourth seed Babar Masih overcame complacency to rout 16th seed Abu Saim 5-2 and make the first ranking final of his career where he is drawn to meet seventh seed Asjad Iqbal who humbled second seed Sohail Shehzad 5-1 at Hotel Movenpick on Friday.

Both the semi-finals of the second ranking snooker championship played on the penultimate day fell short of expectations.

A native of Rawalpindi, 28-year-old Babar, who topped group D followed by 5-1 triumph over Sharjeel Mehmood in the pre-quarters and 5-0 success over former national champion Mohamma Asif Toba in the quarters, was on song as he continued his winning stride in style.

Babar enjoyed an edge over Saim when he scored three splendid breaks of 74 in the second, 53 and 54 in the third frames to earn a commendable 3-0 lead in the best of nine frames encounter taking the frames 63-38, 89 -29, 107-1.

However, Babar who together with Shahram Changezi won a bronze in the IBSF team event held at the same venue last year, lost focus and conceded the fourth and fifth frames 28-70, 20-64 as Saim reduced the deficit 2-3.

But Babar’s fighting skills helped him clinch the following two frames 59-17 and 108-2 and the match.

It is pertinent to mention that Babar had lost to Afghanistan’s Mohammad Rais Senzahi 3-6 in the Asian 6-Reds quarters at Abu Dhabi recently. In the team event too, he together with Mohammad Bilal fell prey to Asif-Asjad duo 2-3 in the quarters.

Asjad put his act together after losing the opening frame to register a stunning 5-1 frames victory over Sohail, losing finalist of the national championship earlier this year.

Asjad, who stole the limelight by scoring two elegant century breaks on the opening day of the event, piled up another 100 break in the second frame to took his tally of century breaks to five so far as he was home 4-86, 100-16, 80-40, 79-0, 72-43, 65-52. Sohail came up with a break of 69 in the opener.

The final between Babar and Asjad will be played on Saturday at 9am.

Results:

Semi-finals: Babar Masih (Punjab) bt Abu Saim (Punjab) 5-2 (63-38, 82-29, 107-1, 28-70, 20-64, 59-17, 108-2); Asjad Iqbal (Punjab) bt Sohail Shehzad (Sindh) 5-1 (4-86, 100-16, 80-40, 79-0, 72-43, 65-52).

Saturday’s fixtures:

Babar Masih v Asjad Iqbal (final) best of 11 frames at 9am.

Published in Dawn, June 4th, 2016