Asif fails to qualify for IBSF World Championship

Cueist crashes out of national ranking event after losing to Toba

KARACHI: Former champion Muhammad Asif lost his chance to qualify for the upcoming IBSF World Championship after being defeated 5-4 by Muhammad Asif Toba in the last-16 round of the 6^th NBP Ranking Snooker Championship on Monday.

Toba initially led the game 3-1, but was given a scare by Asif who fought back to go 4-3 up. However, Toba regained momentum to equalise the score 4-4. The decider was determined by a mere six points as Toba triumphed with scores of 71-44, 22-65, 81-24, 66-29, 29-73, 25-90, 31-56, 80-51 and 57-51.

Asif said that he was disappointed to lose and added that he would adjust to playing with glasses as vision problems had led to serious errors in his game of late.

In other matches, Hamza Akbar beat Muhammad Yousuf 5-3 while Imran Shehzad won against Abu Saim 5-2. Muhammad Sajjad defeated Shahram Changezi 5-3 while defending champion Asjad Iqbal won a nine-frame thriller against Sohail Shehzad.