Dharminder Lilly Lifts Third Race to the Crucible Series Title
Dharminder Lilly defeated former World Seniors champion Lee Walker 4-1 in the final of the third event of the ‘Race to the Crucible’ series at The Crucible Club in Reading.
The 49-year-old came through a field of 49 cueists, which included two former World Seniors Championship winners, to secure the victory and join Alfie Burden and Rory McLeod on this season’s roll of honour.
The Race to the Crucible series sees nine events held across the season with the top two ranked players at the conclusion of the final event earning places at the World Seniors Snooker Championship, while those who finish between third and tenth will qualify for the ‘Top 16 Shootout’ – where a further place in Sheffield will be on offer.
Four nations were represented at The Crucible Club in Reading, where the three-day event got underway on Friday afternoon. Lilly began the event in the last 32 stage and kicked off with a comfortable whitewash win over Ian Desmier.
In the last 16 he faced Steven Nevett, who had defeated Toby Pugh in a deciding frame in the previous round despite Hugh compiling a stunning tournament high break of 141 earlier in the contest.
Nevett proved no match for Lilly, however, as he ran out a 4-1 victor before defeating Anthony Harris by the same scoreline to reach the semi-finals. After sharing the first four frames of the last four meeting with Neil Craycraft, the eventual champion then pulled away to complete a 4-2 win and book his place in the final.
2022 World Seniors champion Walker was his opponent in the title match after the 48-year-old Welshman had shown tremendous form to overcome Jason Pusser, Gerard Greene, Matthew Ford and fellow former World Seniors champion Aaron Canavan to reach the final – compiling a trio of century breaks along the way.
Despite Walker scoring a half-century in the opening frame of the final, it went to way of Lilly by a 72-59 scoreline and he quickly doubled his advantage to 2-0 in the best-of-seven frame match.
Walker briefly rallied to halve the deficit, but Lilly was too strong on the day and took the next two frames to complete a 4-1 victory and secure the title in the third Race to the Crucible series event of the season.
Hunter Wins Super Seniors
John Hunter defeated Mukesh Parmar 2-1 in the final of the Super Seniors event on Sunday to win his second title of the season.
The event is open to all cueists over the age of 55 and was held on Sunday alongside the main Race to the Crucible series event.
Hunter, who won the first Super Seniors title of the season in August, furthered his position at the top of the ranking list by coming through four matches to win the tournament.
The 58-year-old Englishman dropped just a single frame in defeating Dave Moritz, Andy Booker and Dennis Tristam to set up a final meeting with fellow countryman Parmar.
Parmar took the opener of the best-of-three frame title match to move one away from victory, but Hunter hit back to force a decider before taking the decisive frame by a scoreline of 68-40 to secure the title.
Event four of the Race to the Crucible series takes place on 22-24 November at The Crucible Club in Reading. Enter now!
