KARACHI: Pakistan’s former world champion Mohammad Asif won back-to-back matches during the last 24-hours to make it to pre quarterfinals and stay in contention for regaining top honours in the IBSF World Snooker Championships in Turkish city of Antalya on Thursday.

According to results made available here, the incumbent Pakistan No 1 survived a scare to post 4-3 victory over Russian Ivan Kakovskii in the marathon last-64 round to sneak into last-32. After a brisk start that gave him 2-0 lead, Asif lost the grip conceding next three frames to trail 2-3 in the best of seven clash.

However, with rich experience under his belt, he regained his touch winning the last two frames and the match, thanks to a break of 51 in the last frame. Earlier, Ivan had slammed a century break of 112 in the fifth frame.

Asif was home 87-37, 71-42, 35-64, 32-66, 13-112, 85-22, 101-0.

Fresh from the triumph, Asif, who was reseeded second on his performance in group C, made a comeback into the game twice from arrears to inflict 5-3 defeat on Israel’s Shachar Ruberg with the scores being 65-9, 23-109, 47-75, 93-0, 20-51, 62-19, 74-17, 66-55.

Asif conjured up three magnificent breaks of 65, 53 and 74 in the fourth, sixth and seventh frames while his opponent piled up break of 96 in the second.

Asif had blanked another Israeli cueist Daniel Rand 4-0 in the league match. He is drawn to meet Australian James Mifsud in the last-16 match.

Results:

Last-64 round: Mohammad Asif bt Ivan Kakovskii (Russia) 4-3 (87-37, 71-42, 35-64, 32-66, 13-112, 85-22, 101-0).

Last-32 round: Mohammad Asif bt Shachar Ruberg (Israel) 5-3 (65-9, 23-109, 47-75, 93-0, 20-51, 62-19, 74-17, 66-55).

Published in Dawn, November 8th, 2019