Kothari, Damani to battle it out in snooker series

As many as 89 participants from across the country, including the likes of former national billiards champion Sourav Kothari and Brijesh Damani, will be seen in action in the RKG first Open Pro Snooker Series, beginning here on Saturday.

The event running till June 5 will witness participants fighting it out in a knock-out format. With the first three legs already accomplished in Delhi, Ahmedabad and Chennai, the concluding leg here will finalise the 32 who will contest in the summit clash in Mumbai.

The winner of this leg will pocket a cash prize of Rs.1 lakh and with it a glittering trophy. The total prize money of the event, including the final, is Rs.21 lakh.

The top seed is Kamal Chawla who will be competing against other top cueists like Ishpreet Chadha, Varun Madan among others.

As it will be a knockout competition, the first five rounds will be best-of-5 frames, last 32 and last 16 will be best-of-7, quarters and semifinals best-of-9 and final of 11 frames.

"Indians should have many more knockouts. In terms of cue sports, we are obsessed with league-cum-knockouts. Personally there should be more knockouts as there is more excitement and always a chance that newer faces come up, rather than the same old faces coming and playing the quarters and semis," Kothari said on Thursday.

The cueist also believes the format is more challenging as players have to be on their toes all the time.

"Knockout are different; it is primarily because every single ball there is no margin for error, you miss and you might crash out. There is always more pressure in a knockout and that is what makes the format more exciting," he said.

However, Damani believes there is not much difference between a league game and a knockout one.

"You require a lot of self-belief and that's what we do, keep practicing a thing over and over again so that we can perform under pressure. I don't see much of a difference between a league game and a knockout, it is just in the mind," he said.