Musharaff retains title with thrilling win

Champion M.R.M. Musharaff of MSC in action

By M. Shamil Amit

In a home-and-home battle of the U21 National Snooker Championship played at the Billiards and Snooker Association headquarters billiards table at Independence Square in Colombo, defending champion M.R.M. Musharaff of Moors SC retained the title with a thrilling four frames to three win over his clubmate Ahamed Raza.
The championship was dominated by the cueists of Moors SC, who had three of their players battle it out in the two semi-final encounters, but Musharaff did not have it easy as he had to pull out all the tricks out of the bag before managing to retain the title.
The ding-dong battle for the title began with Musharaff taking the lead with an easy first frame win, but Raza came back by taking the second frame, and again, the two cueists shared the next two frames before Raza went into the lead with a comfortable fifth frame win, but Musharaff came back with vengeance to come out victorious in the final two frames to seal the match in his favour.
The championship, conducted by the Billiards and Snooker Association of Sri Lanka and sponsored by Crown Billiard International (Pvt) Ltd., saw the participation of 16 top young cueists.