KARACHI: Abdul Sattar continued his impressive run in the 32nd Sindh Cup Snooker Tournament, edging out Khizar Aziz 4-3 in a thrilling quarter-final match here at the OTC Snooker Arena on Saturday.

Sattar, who had earlier stunned defending champion Ali Hamza, showed remarkable resilience to overcome Khizar 70-10, 02-87, 29-66, 50-57, 54-07, 96-39, 69-57 in a closely contested match.

In an all-Karachi quarter-final clash, Sattar started strong as he took the first frame but Khizar came back in a dominant fashion to win three consecutive frames to go 3-1 up.

With Khizar only frame away from confirming his berth in the semis, Sattar rallied to clinch three frames of his own to steal the spot from his fellow city-mate.

He will now face Ian Mark John, who downed Umair Alam 4-2 [95-10, 28-61, 36-75, 72-14, 63-17, 70-31], in the semi-finals.

In the other last-eight match, the Hyderabad’s cueist Umer Naeem whitewashed Umair Khan 4-0 [62-61, 63-22, 76-19, 63-09].

Zulfiqar A. Qadir also advanced to the last-four stage with a hard-fought 4-3 [128-04(106), 32-70, 77-23(77), 44-64, 60-59, 40-64, 60-23] win over Ali Raza.

In a see-saw match, Zulfiqar registered a century-break in the first frame of the match but Ali retaliated immediately to level the score. Zulfiqar went ahead again with a break of 77. Both the cueists traded frames to tie the match at 3-3 but ultimately Zulfiqar prevailed into the semi-finals.

The semi-final matches are scheduled to take place on Sunday.

Published in Dawn, December 15th, 2024