In most sporting disciplines, administrators look at grass root support to foster the game, but Capt. P.V.K Mohan, who heads a federation which is steeped in success stories, believes the sport has to be popularised at the international level for it to garner strength in the domestic arena.
The Billiards and Snooker Federation of India’s president said, “What our two players (Pankaj Advani and Rupesh Shah) have won this time is the first edition of the ranking event in billiards. Now on, more billiards tournaments will be held and compulsorily there has to be an Asian-leg even if it is not to the level of snooker, where almost every month you have a tournament in some part of the world.
“Globally, the acceptance for billiards is not much except for some countries in Europe and Asia. By developing this and getting ranking tournaments, the interest will increase. Once the participation goes up, that will automatically percolate down to the national level,” said Mohan.
While the sport has fetched phenomenal success for the country, there hasn’t been a corresponding rise in the number of players taking up the sport.
“We are planning a series of tourneys and are in talks to conduct the Cue Masters League. We are now busy with a flurry of tournaments and are also looking at hosting one leg of the world snooker ranking event. All our efforts are now in that direction and simultaneously we are working on the CML, in which all three formats – pool, snooker and billiards – will be played.
“We are looking at an IPL like format, starting with six teams and concepts like icon players and will allow participation of two overseas players. We are still working on it and hopefully by the middle of next year we will put it into place.”