KARACHI, July 11: Defending champion Saleh Muhammadan has been drawn in tough group “E” in the 11th Red and White Cup National Ranking Championship being held at Pearl-2 Snooker Club, Clifton from July 29-Aug 3.

Saleh of NWFP is drawn with talented Southpaw Vishan Gir from Sindh, Asian championship losing quarterfinalist Abu Saim of Punjab and former Sindh Champion Mirza Shadab Baig.

Top two players from each of eight groups will advance into the pre-quarterfinal knock out stage of Rs 174,000 prize money event.

The winner of the event will get Rs 55,000 and runners-up collect Rs 35,000.

Pakistan number one Khurram Hussain Agha of Sindh has been top seeded for the event while Muhammad Yousuf of Sindh is seeded two, Farhan Mirza from Punjab is seeded three and Naveen Perwani of Sindh is seeded four.

Following is the grouping.

Group “A” Khurram Hussain Agha (Sindh), Muhammad Nazir (Punjab), Kamran Shah (Bolchistan), Naseer Khan (Bolchistan).

Group “B” Muhammed Yousuf (Sindh), Faiq Malik (Punjab), Danish Haroon (Sindh), Khurram Khan (Punjab).

Group “C” Farhan Mirza (Punjab), Abdul Qadeer Butt (Punjab), Faisal Essa (Sindh), Irfan Rasheed Khan (Sindh).

Group “D” Naveen Perwani (Sindh), Fahad Asif (Punjab), Mustafa Hyder (Bolchistan), Farhan Noor (Punjab).

Group “E” Saleh Mohammed (NWFP), Vishan Gir (Sindh), Abu Saim (Punjab), Shadab Baig (Sindh).

Group “F” Imran Shahzad (Punjab), Amit Parwani (Sindh), Saqib Butt (Punjab), Younus Amir Bux (Sindh).

Group “G” Atiq Latif Bakhsh (Sindh), Arifullah (NWFP), Raja Rashid (Punjab), Raees Khan (Punjab).

Group “H” Minhas Malik (Sindh), Shakeel Bhatti (Sindh), Ahmer Shaikh (Sindh), Azeem Akhtar (Punjab).—APP