The Pan­thers have not been hav­ing the best of sea­sons in the Na­tion­al Pool League (NPL) Eight Ball com­pe­ti­tion. Play­ing in Group B of the NPL, the Shamir Ny­sus-cap­tained Pan­thers have won four match­es in eleven out­ings.

Their most re­cent win came in round 12 on Tues­day, against Cen­tral Stars B. In what could be con­sid­ered an up­set, the eighth-placed Pan­thers record­ed a close 3-2 win against the fourth-placed ‘Stars’, and they did it away from home, at Ken­ny’s Sports Bar in Ch­agua­nas.

Ny­sus led from the front as he was drawn to play Dar­rion Bis­soon in the open­ing game. The Pan­thers cap­tain lost the first frame, but bounced back in em­phat­ic fash­ion, win­ning the next three on the trot. The sec­ond game was a car­bon copy of the first, but in re­verse. Waz­im Mo­hammed came up against the Cen­tral Stars’ cap­tain, Nand­lal ‘Pen­ny’ Ram­lakhan. Mo­hammed won the first frame, on­ly for ‘Pen­ny’ to mir­ror his op­po­site num­ber by win­ning three straight as well.

Those two games seemed to set the tone for the night as the vis­it­ing dou­bles pair of Shane Win­ter-Roach and Bri­an So­rias aka ‘Scraper’ went un­der in the first rack against An­dre Lamothe and Adri­an Jat­tan but, like the win­ners be­fore them, hit back with three straight as well, giv­ing the vis­i­tors a 2-1 match lead. The next two games al­so saw sweep­ing three-nil wins. Daniel Ram­sawak tied things up for the home team with a 3-0 re­sult against Kevin Car­dinez, much to the de­light of the ‘Stars’ and their sup­port­ers.

The vis­i­tors would have the last laugh, how­ev­er, as Gre­go­ry Gayadeeen al­so record­ed a three–nil win against Randy Deo, to put the Pan­thers back in win­ners’ row, af­ter a three-match slide. The Pan­thers’ po­si­tion on the stand­ings does not change but that win would def­i­nite­ly lift their spir­its go­ing in­to week 13. Cen­tral Stars, mean­while, have now dropped out of the top four and sit at five on the group B stand­ings with five wins and six loss­es.

An­oth­er up­set high­light­ed pro­ceed­ings in Group A with Ago­ra Stingers hand­ing the Pock­et Preda­tors a 3-2 loss, their sec­ond de­feat in a row. The ‘Stingers’, who were sixth on the ta­ble go­ing in­to Tues­day’s match, were com­ing up against the sec­ond-placed Preda­tors. Ganesh Be­dassie, the fa­ther and son duo of Amar and Justin Chan and Ken­neth Sood­een were vic­to­ri­ous for the Ago­ra squad, while Stephen Her­nan­dez and Thakoor Maraj won their games for the vis­it­ing Preda­tors. With the win, the Amar Chan-led ‘Stingers’ moves up one spot to fifth with five wins and six loss­es and the Pock­et Preda­tors, who are cap­tained by Bri­an Stod­dard, re­main in sec­ond spot with eight wins and three loss­es.

Re­sults

First di­vi­sion match­es: (Num­bers in brack­ets = Po­si­tion on stand­ings)

Group A

(1) Sikar­i­oz Bil­liards Club 4 def (8) Knight Rid­ers II 1

(5) Ago­ra Stingers 3 def (2) Pock­et Preda­tors 2

(3) Zhao 3 def (7) Ex­pend­ables 2

(4) Spe­cial Brew 4 def (9) Scotchies’ Spar­tans 1

(6) JJ Shoot­ers - Bye

Group B

(3) Crazy 8’s 4 vs (1) Orinoco Blood 1

(2) Knight Rid­ers I 4 def Top Shooterz Krew 1

(8) Pan­thers 3 def Cen­tral Stars B 2

(4) Cue Mas­ters vs (9) Mu­cu­rapo Mus­ke­teers (Resched­uled)

Tues­day’s match­es

Group A

Knight Rid­ers II vs Ago­ra Stingers at Lucky’s, Williamsville

Zhao vs Sikar­i­oz BC at Pyra­mid, Gas­par­il­lo

Scotchies’ Spar­tans vs Ex­pend­ables at Shindig, Curepe

JJ Shoot­ers vs Spe­cial Brew at Jer­ry Junc­tion, Cara­pi­caima

Pock­et Preda­tors – Bye

Group B

Pan­thers vs Rox­bury Shot Callers at Rox­bury, Cunu­pia

Top Shooterz Krew vs Cen­tral Stars B at Bil­liards Place, Aranguez

Crazy 8’s vs Knight Rid­ers I at Spe­cial Brew, Cou­va

Mu­cu­rapo Mus­ke­teers vs Orinoco B at On Mu­cu­rapo, St. James

Cue Mas­ters - Bye