KARACHI: The trio of Asjad Iqbal, Mohammad Asif and Mubashir Raza were through to the last-64 round as junior world champion Mohammad Naseem Akhtar crashed out of the International Billiards and Snooker Federation (IBSF) world snooker championships at Doha on Wednesday.

According to results made available here, former world champion Asif finished second in group ‘F’ winning four of the five matches as Ko Htet of Mynamar emerged group champion with a cent percent record. The latter had shocked Asif by notching up 4-1 victory.

Asjad and Steve Mifsud (Australia) were through to the knockout round from group ‘M’. The match between them will decided the No I and No 2 slots.

Debutant Mubashir also completed his league engagements and topped group ‘L’.

As far as master’s category is concerned, Pakistan’s veteran world champion Mohammad Yousuf and former Pakistan No 1 Khurram Agha cruised into the last-30 stage.

Yousuf has maintained an unbeaten run and is the only cueist in group who had won all his four matches so far with one match remaining.

Khurram, on the other hand, is following in the footsteps of Yousuf having won all his three matches. With three wins under his belt, Darren Morgan of the Wales is likely to join Khurram.

Imran Shahzad, the third player who is competing in the master’s, has been able to win two of the four matches and failed to cross the first hurdle.

Tuesday’’s remaining results:

Men’s: Mubashir Raza bt Rafii Amrou (Morocco) 4-0 (59-11, 87-5, 58-46, 65-50); Asjad Iqbal bt Yilmaz Yildrim (Turkey) 4-0 (80-7, 71-13, 75-11, 114-9); Brendan O’Donoghue (Ireland) bt Mohammad Naseem Akhtar 4-1 (62-61, 103-0, 47-60, 80-13, 66-9.

Master’s: Noel Rodrigues Moreira (Brasil) bt Imran Shehzad 3-1 (32-80, 85-1, 64-13, 72-0).

Published in Dawn, November 23rd, 2017