Nayan Naresh of Gujarat will have no regrets losing 5-2 to Arjuna Awardee Alok Kumar in a seven frame match played in the National Pool championship. Infact,he must have picked up the finer nuances of the game from a player who has a vast experience of 25 years. The celebrations by the Asian snooker champ were muted,as he seeks to rejoice only once he manages to win a medal in the Asian Games for his country. We have set high standards in billiards and snooker and we are delivering the goods at the international level. But pool is relatively a fresh format in the Indian circuit,so a lot of hard work is expected from us to match the international standards,Alok Kumar said,speaking to Sportline. Although India is among the leading countries in snooker and billiards,the Indian contingent failed to impress last year on the international front in pool despite the fact that there is no dearth of talent in the country. The cueist feels that every new sport takes time to leave a mark and a proper system is needed to refine the young talent. The love for pool is apparent among the players from the northern states since they get to play pool tournaments very often. The players should be trained in such a manner that they can eventually play at par with some of the best in the world,Kumar added. Kumar,who went to the Philippines in 2006 to train under coach George Decer,feels that he has gained from the expertise of a foreign coach and that other Indian players will also prosper from hiring one. It is definitely going to help the players who get to the top eight. The Indians lack technical skills which can be improved by the assistance of a foreign mentor. It would be great if the final eight be sent to the South Asian Countries 15 days before the games commence,he said. The cueist said that to beat the top countries in the world,one must first understand how to play like them. To beat the likes of China,Thailand,Myanmar and other South Asian Countries,it is important to ingrain the style and tactics that these employ in the game. Manan has it easy Manan Chandra dominated the table for the second consecutive day,as he ousted his opponent Manmeet Bhatia in clear frames 5-0 to qualify for the knockout stage. Along with him,Alok Kumar,Rafath Habib,Kamal Chawla and Dharminder Lilly too clinched easy wins to pave their way into the knockout round. Results: 8-Ball Pool Alok Kumar beat Nayan Naresh 5-2,Manan Chandra (PSPB) beat Manmeet Bhatia (DEL) 5-0,Kamal Chawla (RLY) beat Mudit Gupta (DEL) 5-1,Rafath Habib (RLY) beat Dipayan Kothari (WB) 5-1,Alok Kumar (PSPB) beat Shrenik Jain (DEL) 5-2,Dharminder Lilly (PB) beat A.R. Arjun (KTK) 5-3
