Akbar vows to come back stronger

Cueist bows out after getting burned by Barns in world championship qualifier

KARACHI: Pakistan’s youngest national champion, Hamza Akbar, lost his Professional World Snooker Championship qualifying round match 10-3 against England’s Ian Barns and crashed out of the last event of the professional circuit.

The defeat ended Akbar’s first year as a professional cueist and he will now come back to Pakistan for a few months before heading back to UK to prepare for next year’s tour.

Akbar is the first Pakistani to feature in the Professional World Championship and won his first qualifying round match against world number 33 Jamie Jones last week.



This time around though, he was against a much better player in Barns, who took the first frame 103-01 and set the tone for rest of the match.

There were not many big breaks from Barns but most of his frames were won by convincing margins as he triumphed with an overall scoreline of 103-1, 64-20, 14-94 (50), 93-01, 58-26, 75-29, 06-68, 84-0 (84), 70-01 (61), 70-36, 17-75, 76-07 and 73-44.

Akbar, meanwhile, admitted he was not good enough on the day and Barns was far superior. “Barns was outstanding and was a deserving winner in the end.



“I would like to wish Barns good luck for his campaign and want to thank everyone who supported me,” said Akbar.

He further added: “Unfortunately, this is the end for me but I’ve gained a lot by playing with the best players of the world. The professional circuit takes a lot out of you, but I’ll come back stronger in next season.”

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th,  2016.

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