Asif struggles but Sajjad saves the day for Pakistan 1

Near-perfect start for four of the host teams

KARACHI: Former IBSF World Team Champions Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Sajjad enjoyed an easy outing on the first day of the IBSF World Team Championship as they won both of their matches on Thursday.

Playing under the name of Pakistan 1, they first conquered Malaysia’s duo Keen Hoo Moh and Kok Leong Lim 3-2.

The Malaysians took an early lead when Keen got the better of Asif, but it was nullified in style by Sajjad, who won his singles match with a break of 108 points.

The Pakistani pair then led for the first time in the match by winning the third frame — which was the doubles frame. Asif once again went down to Keen in the fourth frame which took the match into a decider.

Sajjad was the difference again in his singles frame and helped his team win by a scoreline of 22-83, 108 (108)-0, 106-24, 23-74 and 114-0 (90).

The duo won their second match 4-1 against Iran 2 — consisting of Hamed Zarehdoust and Pedram Arteshyar — with relative ease, but once again, Asif was in the line of fire.

The former IBSF World Individual Champion was downed in the first frame by Hamed, requiring Sajjad to rescue the game by winning the second. The doubles frame went in the favour of Pakistan as well, after which Asif finally managed to win his first singles frame to help Pakistan lead 3-1. Sajjad wrapped up the victory by winning the last frame as they triumphed with scores of 42-75, 88-13, 113-16 (75), 96-0 (95) and 76-14.

Asjad hits highest break

Pakistan’s Asjad Iqbal, who was one of the only two players to score a perfect 75 in the World 6-Red competition along with Asif, achieved the highest break on the opening day of team competition as Pakistan 3 beat Qatar 4-1.

Paired up with Shahid Aftab, the duo had earlier lost their opening match 4-1 against India 3.

But Asjad turned that defeat into motivation against Qatari players as he notched up a 138-point break in the first frame, which enabled Pakistan to win by scores of 138-0 (138), 11-125, 76-45, 60-12 and 57-52.

Meanwhile, Pakistan 4, comprising Imran Shehzad and Sohail Shehzad, were also off to a solid start as they first dished out a 5-0 defeat to UAE 2 5-0 and then handed a 3-2 beating to Saudi Arabia 2.

Elsewhere, the pair of Shahram Changezi and Babar Masih (Pakistan 2) won both of their matches as well, triumphing 4-1 and 3-2 against Qatar 2 and Afghanistan respectively.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 13^th, 2015.

Like Sports on Facebook, follow @ETribuneSports on Twitter to stay informed and join in the conversation.