Ludhiana, April 4 Ace cueist Pankaj Advani played the crucial points well under pressure to defeat a determined Pushpender Singh for a memorable double in his maiden national pool championships here on Saturday.
In the men's final of the 10-ball pool event, Advani of PSPB won a hard-fought 11-9 victory over his RSPB rival.
Later, fellow Bengaluru player Chitra Magimaiaraj rallied splendidly to defeat Neena Praveen of Tamil Nadu 6-4 in the women's final, completing an impressive double.
The men's final was a close contest. Although Pushpender started strongly, Advani, who had already won the 9-ball title a few days ago, fought back brilliantly to level the score at 3-3 in the race-to-11 affair.
Advani gained the upper hand in the 16th rack.
Pushpender seemed poised to make a break, but missed a routine pot of No. 8, allowing Advani to level the score.
Advani capitalized on another error from Pushpender in the next rack to take the lead for the first time in the final at 9-8. A poor break from Pushpender in the 18th rack allowed Advani to extend his lead to 10-8.
Pushpender then made a brilliant rack and run when Advani failed to pot a ball off his break in the next. In the 20th rack, the RSPB cueist made a couple of brilliant recovery shots before he snookered himself after taking No. 7 to the bottom right-hand pocket.
Advani then potted the remaining balls to claim the title.
In the women's final, Chitra took a 5-3 lead in the race-to-6 title clash.
Neena reduced the margin by winning the ninth rack, and the Chennai cueist looked set to level the score.
However, she missed a simple pot of No. 8 to the centre pocket, and her chances of reaching the decider were lost.
The composed Chitra closed out the rack and the match without much ado.