MUMBAI: Ace cueist
Panjaj Advani
has won his second
TOISA
award, being adjudged Billiards Player of the Year at the Mahindra Scorpio
Times of India Sports Awards
in Mumbai. At the inaugural TOISA in 2015, Advani had bagged the Popular Choice Award.
Advani faced stiff competition from Siddharth Parikh, Sourav Kothari and Dhruv Sitwala.
The TOISA awards, which reward the best of Indian sport in 2016 and celebrate the future and golden past of the country's athletes, were pushed back a few months on account of the Rio Olympics. At the quadrennial Games, Sindhu won the biggest prize in the history of Indian badminton - an Olympic silver, to go past Saina Nehwal's bronze five years ago in London.
In May 2016, the 31-year-old Advani won the Asian 6-Red Snooker title for the third time and became the first player to hold the world title as well as the continental title at the same time. In December, he won his 11th World Billiards (150-Up format) Championships title by beating multiple world champion Peter Gilchrist six games to three, making it his 16th world title overall.
In March, Parikh won a bronze medal at the Asian Billiards Championship in Sri Lanka, followed up in October with gold at the Asian Billards Sports in Al-Fujairah, UAE and then in December stunned Gilchrist in a 500-483 win at the IBSF World Billiards Champions in 500 long-up format.
In January 2016, Kothari won the National Billiards title by beating Parikh 5-2 and as the year closed, he beat Advani in the quarter-finals of the IBSF World Championships in Long-Up format. In the final, he lost to Gilchrist 1500-617.
The reigning Asian billiards champion, Sitwala successfully defended his crown at the Asian Billiards Championship when he beat compatriot Bhaskar Balachandra 6-2 in the final in Sri Lanka.
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