Mumbai : Exhibiting a cool composed demeanour Hardik Vyas produced match-winning performances to help NIA ‘Quarter-Pillars’ recover from 0-2 deficit to put it across home favourites PJHG ‘Golmaal’ in a pre-quarter-final match of the PJHG Global Ocean Group-Mumbai Snooker League (MSL) – 2015, being played at the Wilson Jones Billiards Hall at the P.J. Hindu Gymkhana.
The MSL is being conducted by the BSAM (Billiards and Snooker Association of Maharashtra). After the home side won the opening two frames to take a 2-0 lead, the 23-year-old Vyas came to the table and turned things around. Playing with a handicap of +50 Vyas prevailed over Dhruv Sitwala (+25) 95-87 before his teammate Divesh Gangawani (+45) overcame the clever play of upcoming snooker star Rahul Sachdev (+10) to snatch a 84-76 win and level the scores at 2-all. In the deciding frame, Vyas once again kept his cool and showed steady nerves to stave off a strong fight back from seasoned Siddharth Parikh (+5) to clinch a close win and seal NIA’s place in the quarter-finals.
Earlier, Sachdev stole the thunder compiling a neat run of 78 in his win against Gangwani in the first frame.
In another match, Yasin Merchant (scratch handicap) won a crucial fifth frame of the black ball against Vishal Madan (+35) to secure a close 3-2 win for KG ‘Avengers’ against CG Gladiators’.
