Defending champion Pankaj Advani and veteran Geet Sethi led the way as the top eight seeds made their way into the quarters of the time format World Billiards championship on Sunday.

Advani will lock horns with Sourav Kothari while Sethi is lined up with Thai Thawat Sujaritthurakam. If both win their respective matches, they face each other in the semi-finals.

But both played down that prospective match, choosing to conentrate on the immediate assignment. “I am really worried about Sourav. He is playing better and if he gets a good start then things might turn difficult for me,” said Advani.

Sethi too is wary about the potential of Sujaritthurakam. “I believe that every day is a new day and you can’t expect to carry today’s form into the next day. My first concern is the last eight game,” said the 47-year-old.

In other interesting tussles on offer in the quarters will be the battle between two Mumbaiites Dhruv Sitwala and Devendra Joshi. While Joshi had a relatively easy outing against Irish player Aidan Murray, Sitwala struggled to overcome Thai star Praprut Chaithanasakun.

Other results: Thawat Sujarithurakarn (Tha) bt B Bhaskar (Ind) 958-832; Peter Gilchrist (Sin) bt Thanh Long Nguyen (Vie) 1660-767; Rupesh Shah (Ind) bt Prem Prakash (Ind) 1879-792