Pankaj Arjan Advani (born 24 July 1985) is an Indian

billiards Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as . There are three major subdivisions of ...

and former professional

snooker Snooker (pronounced , ) is a cue sports, cue sport played on a Billiard table#Snooker and English billiards tables, rectangular table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six Billiard table#Pockets 2, pockets, one at each corner and o ...

player. He is a 25-time

International Billiards and Snooker Federation The International Billiards & Snooker Federation (IBSF) is an organisation that governs non-professional snooker and English billiards around the world. As of January 2020, the organisation is headquartered in Doha, Qatar. History The World Bill ...

(IBSF) world champion. He has won 17 billiards world titles, the

IBSF World Billiards Championship The IBSF World Billiards Championship (previously known as the World Amateur Billiards Championship) is the premier, international, non-professional tournament for the game of English billiards. Dating to some form to 1951, the event has been sanc ...

on 16 occasions and the World Team Billiards Championship once. In snooker, he won the

IBSF World Snooker Championship The IBSF World Snooker Championship (also known as the World Amateur Snooker Championship) is the premier non-professional snooker tournament in the world. The event series is sanctioned by the International Billiards and Snooker Federation. A nu ...

three times, IBSF World six-red championship twice and the IBSF World Team Cup and IBSF World Team Championship one time each. He has the record number of IBSF world championships. He became a snooker professional in 2012/2013. In recognition of his achievements, the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, c ...

has bestowed several awards upon Advani: the

Arjuna Award The Arjuna Award, officially known as Arjuna Awards for Outstanding Performance in Sports and Games, is the second-highest sporting honour of India, the highest being the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award. The award is named after Arjuna, one ...

in 2004,

Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna The Khel Ratna Award (), officially known as the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award ( Major Dhyan Chand Sport Jewel Award), is the highest sporting honour of India. It is awarded annually by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Governm ...

in 2006,

Padma Shri Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, ...

in 2009 and

Padma Bhushan The Padma Bhushan is the third-highest civilian award in the Republic of India, preceded by the Bharat Ratna and the Padma Vibhushan and followed by the Padma Shri. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is given for "distinguished service ...

in 2018.

Early life

Pankaj Advani was born on 24 July 1985 to a Sindhi family in

Pune Pune (; ; also known as Poona, (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million ...

, India. Advani spent his initial years in

Kuwait Kuwait (; ar, الكويت ', or ), officially the State of Kuwait ( ar, دولة الكويت '), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated in the northern edge of Eastern Arabia at the tip of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to the nort ...

before moving to

Bangalore Bangalore (), officially Bengaluru (), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan population of around , making it the third most populous city and fifth most ...

, India. He received his education at the Frank Anthony Public School, Bangalore and completed his bachelor's degree in Commerce from Sri Bhagawan Mahaveer Jain College. He received training in snooker from former national Snooker champion Arvind Savur. At the age of 10 his acumen for snooker came to the notice of Arvind Savur after being introduced to the sport by his elder brother Dr. Shree Advani, a noted Sport & Performance Psychologist. He won his first ever title at the age of 11 and went on to set several records at the state and national levels. In the year 2000 he won his first Indian Junior Billiards Championship title and then went on to win it again in 2001 and 2003. In 2003 he not only won the Indian Junior Snooker and Billiards Championship, he also won the senior snooker champions which made him the youngest National Snooker champion at age 17.

Billiards career

Advani made his international competitive debut in 1999 at the World Billiards Championship in England. After World Snooker Champion title win in 2003, he won the

in 2005 at Qawra, Malta, where he became the first to achieve a "Grand Double" by winning both the time and point formats, making him the first cueist to achieve that feat. He has won the "Grand Double" on three occasions, 2008 in Bangalore, 2014 in England and 2018 in Myanmar. He is the only Indian to have won the amateur world title in both snooker and billiards. Advani has the distinction of winning all five national, regional, and world billiards tournaments in a single season, a feat he achieved by winning the Indian Junior National Championship and Senior National Championship, the Asian Billiards Championship, and both the World Billiards Championship (point format) and World Billiards Championship (time format) in 2005. In April 2012, Advani won the Asian Billiards Championship in Goa, India to become the first player to win 5 Asian Billiards Champion titles. It was announced in May that Advani had accepted the Indian

wildcard Wild card most commonly refers to: * Wild card (cards), a playing card that substitutes for any other card in card games * Wild card (sports), a tournament or playoff place awarded to an individual or team that has not qualified through normal pla ...

place on the main snooker tour for the 2012–13 season. In October 2012, in Leeds, England, Advani won his seventh (counting professional and amateur)

World Billiards World Billiards (Limited) was founded in November 2011 as a subsidiary of the World Professional Billiards & Snooker Association (WPBSA). It includes former members of EBOS (English-Billiards Open Series) and WPBSA, and is the governing body for ...

Championship title, eighth world title overall, beating defending and nine-time WPBSA World Billiards Champion Mike Russell again, in the timed division final (Advani did not make it to the points division final). On 14 August 2014, Advani helped win the first ever World Team Billiards Championship held in Glasgow, Scotland, along with Rupesh Shan, Devendra Joshi and Ashok Shandilya. On 2 February 2017, Pankaj Advani won his 29th National Championship Title at the PYC Hindu Gymkhana in Pune, India. This gave him a 39 match-winning streak. Overall, as of 2017 Advani had won 60 titles: 19 world titles; 8 Asian titles; 2 Asian Games titles; 1 Australian Open title and 30 national titles. In 2018, Advani won his 7th Asian Billiards Title in Myanmar making him the maximum holder of the Asian Title. On March 11, 2020, won the 6 reds national snooker championship in Ahmedabad taking his total tally of national champions to 34. (11 junior and 23 senior).

Snooker career

Pankaj Advani, on international competitive debut in the discipline, won the IBSF World Snooker Championship (i.e. the World Amateur Snooker Championship) on 25 October 2003 in Jiangmen, China. He was 18 years old, and became the youngest Indian to win the title, his first world title. When he was 28-years-old, at the IBSF World 6-Red World Snooker Championship in Sharm-El-Sheik, Egypt, a feat he repeated in August 2015 after he successfully defended the title in Karachi, Pakistan. As a new player on the tour, Advani would need to win four matches to reach the main stage of the ranking events. He did this in just his fourth attempt, when qualifying for the

International Championship The International Championship is a professional ranking snooker tournament. The reigning champion is Judd Trump. History The event was introduced in the 2012/2013 season. It was named as the "first overseas 'major'", because the tournament ha ...

. He defeated

Craig Steadman Craig Steadman (born 14 July 1982) is an English professional snooker player. Career Early career Steadman began his professional career by playing Challenge Tour in 2001, at the time the second-level professional tour. He reached the quarte ...

6–1, six-time world champion

Steve Davis Steve Davis (born 22 August 1957) is an English retired professional snooker player who is currently a Sports commentator, commentator, musician, DJ, and author. He is best known for dominating professional snooker during the 1980s, when he rea ...

6–5 (after being 1–4 down),

Alan McManus Alan McManus (born 21 January 1971) is a Scottish retired professional snooker player and current commentator who works for Eurosport. A mainstay of the world's top sixteen during the 1990s and 2000s, he has won two ranking events, the 1994 Du ...

6–3 and Michael Holt 6–4 to reach the venue stage for the first time. He made four s during qualification, the most of any player. Advani was to play a wildcard match once at the tournament in

Chengdu Chengdu (, ; Simplified Chinese characters, simplified Chinese: 成都; pinyin: ''Chéngdū''; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: ), Chinese postal romanization, alternatively Romanization of Chi ...

, China, to reach the last 32, however he decided to withdraw from the tournament to take part in the World Billiards Championship, which he went on to win. He also reached the semi-finals of the minor ranking European Tour Event 1, beating four-time world champion

John Higgins John Higgins, (born 18 May 1975) is a Scottish professional snooker player. He has won 31 career ranking titles, placing him in third position on the all-time list of ranking event winners, behind Ronnie O'Sullivan (39) and Stephen Hendry ( ...

4–1 along the way. Advani lost to

Mark Selby Mark Anthony Selby (born 19 June 1983) is an English professional snooker player, who is a four-time World Snooker Champion. Ranked world number one on multiple occasions, he has won a total of 21 ranking titles, placing him eighth on the ...

2–4. Advani played in eight of the ten of these

Players Tour Championship The Players Tour Championship was a series of snooker tournaments comprising some minor-ranking events played in Europe, and an Asian leg comprising some minor-ranking events in Asia. The series concluded with a Grand Final, where qualification ...

events and finished 40th on the Order of Merit. At the 2013 Welsh Open, he became the first Indian player to reach the quarter-final stage of a ranking event with a 4–1 win over

Graeme Dott Graeme Dott (born 12 May 1977) is a Scottish professional snooker player and snooker coach from Larkhall. He turned professional in 1994 and first entered the top 16 in 2001. He has won two ranking titles, the 2006 World Snooker Championship a ...

in the last 16, but lost 2–5 to

Judd Trump Judd Trump (born 20 August 1989) is an English professional snooker player, a former world champion and former world number one. Widely regarded as one of the sport's most talented players, he is currently sixth on the list of all-time ranki ...

. Advani's season ended when he was beaten 8–10 by

Joe Swail Joe Swail (born 29 August 1969) is a Northern Irish former professional snooker player from Belfast. He retired in May 2019 after being relegated from the tour. He has reached ten major ranking semi-finals, including the 2000 and 2001 World Cha ...

in the first round of World Championship Qualifying. He was ranked world number 74 after his first year on the main snooker tour.

2013/2014

The 2013–14 season saw the introduction of a ranking event in Advani's home country of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

for the first time which he qualified for by beating

Matthew Selt Matthew Selt (born 7 March 1985) is an English professional snooker player originally from Romford, east London and now living in Chelmsford, Essex. He qualified for the professional tour by finishing seventh on the Pontin's International Open ...

4–0. At the tournament in New Delhi Advani defeated

Marcus Campbell Marcus Campbell (born 22 September 1972) is a Scottish former professional snooker player. He was ranked within the world's top 64 for 15 consecutive seasons. Career Campbell is most famous for whitewashing Stephen Hendry 9–0 in the 1998 ...

4–1 and

Mark Allen Mark may refer to: Currency * Bosnia and Herzegovina convertible mark, the currency of Bosnia and Herzegovina * East German mark, the currency of the German Democratic Republic * Estonian mark, the currency of Estonia between 1918 and 1927 * Finn ...

4–2. His match with Allen finished at 11 pm local time, with Advani back in last 16 action at 10 am the next morning to play

Stuart Bingham Stuart Bingham (born 21 May 1976) is an English professional snooker player who is a former world and Masters champion. Bingham won the 1996 World Amateur Championship but enjoyed little sustained success in the early part of his professional ...

. The match went to a deciding frame and when Bingham broke down on a break of 30, Advani stepped in to compose a match winning 86. Advani played compatriot

Aditya Mehta Aditya Mehta (born 31 October 1985 in Mumbai, India) is an Indian former professional snooker player. He participated on the World Snooker Tour for the 2007–08 season, and between 2011 and 2018. He reached a highest world ranking of 49. Mehta ...

in the quarter-finals in an iconic match in Indian snooker as the winner would be the country's first ranking event semi-finalist. The match was heavily focused on safety and it was Mehta who advanced with a 4–3 win. His best run in a ranking event during the rest of the season was at the World Open, where he narrowly beat

Xiao Guodong Xiao Guodong (, born 10 February 1989) is a Chinese professional snooker player. He turned professional in 2007 after winning the Asian Under-21 Championships. Career 2007–2010 Xiao appeared as a wildcard in the 2007 China Open, and beat t ...

5–4 to set up a last 32 meeting with

Ding Junhui Ding Junhui (; born 1 April 1987) is a Chinese professional snooker player. He is the most successful Asian player in the history of the sport. Throughout his career, he has won 14 major ranking titles, including three UK Championships (2005 ...

. Advani had a lead of 4–2 in the best of nine frame match and was 35 points to 0 ahead in the seventh frame to be on the cusp of a shock result against the player who had already won four ranking events this season. However, Ding made a break of 52 to win the frame, compiled a 136 to draw level and won the deciding frame in one visit to defeat Advani. Advani's successful season saw him finish inside the top 64 in the world rankings for the first time as he was placed 56th.

2014/2015

Advani didn't enter any tournaments until September 2014, when he announced that he was relinquishing his snooker tour card to concentrate on his billiards career and spend more time with his family. He received an invite to participate in the wildcard round of the

2015 Indian Open The 2015 Indian Open was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place between 10 and 14 March 2015 at the Grand Hyatt in Mumbai, India. The tournament was originally scheduled for 13–17 October 2014, but was postponed until March ...

, but lost 4–3 to

Rhys Clark Rhys Edward Clark (born 17 September 1946 in Auckland, New Zealand) is a New Zealand drummer who, since moving to the United States in 1970, has played with such artists as Hoyt Axton, Freddy Fender and, most notably, Billy Joel. Biograp ...

2015/2016

In May 2016 he won the Asian 6-Red Snooker title. He became the first player in the world to hold the world title as well as the continental title at the same time after he beat Malaysian Keen Hoh Moh 7–5. In the same tournament, Advani sailed to the semi-finals of the World Amateur Snooker Championship where he lost to Thailand's Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn.

2016/2017

Advani received an entry in to the wildcard round of the Indian Open and he beat

Fang Xiongman Fang Xiongman (,born 9 April 1993) is a former Chinese professional snooker player. Career Fang began competing at professional events in 2012, which included Asian Tour events as well as wildcard rounds of ranking tournaments. His most notable ...

4–2 and

Elliot Slessor Elliot Slessor (born 4 August 1994) is an English professional snooker player. In May 2013, Slessor qualified for the 2013–14 and 2014–15 professional Main Tour as one of four semi-finalists from the first Q School event. Career Slessor ...

4–0, before losing 4–3 to

Stephen Maguire Stephen Maguire (born 13 March 1981) is a Scottish professional snooker player. He has won six major ranking tournaments, including the 2004 UK Championship, and has twice since reached the finals of that event. Maguire turned professional i ...

in the third round. He won all of his group matches at the

Six-red World Championship The Six-red World Championship is a six-red snooker tournament, played with the six and six . Ding Junhui is the reigning champion. History The event was first held in the 2008/2009 season, and was known as the Six-red Snooker Internationa ...

and then eliminated Lukas Kleckers 6–0 and Yuan Sijun 6–4. Michael Holt withdrew from the event which moved Advani straight in to the semi-finals, where he was defeated 7–4 by

Performance and rankings timeline of professional snooker

Titles

World Titles – 25 Billiards

(Point Format) – 8 (2005, 2008, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2022)

(Long Format) – 8 (2005,2007, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2018) World Team Billiards Championship – 1 (2014) Snooker

(15 Reds) – 3 (2003, 2015, 2017)

(6 Reds) – 2 (2014, 2015) IBSF 6-Red Snooker World Cup – 1 (2021) IBSF World Team Cup – 1 (2018) IBSF World Team Championship – 1 (2019)

Asian Games The Asian Games, also known as Asiad, is a continental multi-sport event held every four years among athletes from all over Asia. The Games were regulated by the Asian Games Federation (AGF) from the first Games in New Delhi, India, until t ...

2006 Asian Games, Doha - Gold Medal (English Billiards – Singles) 2010 Asian Games, Guangzhou – Gold Medal (English Billiards – Singles) Asian Titles – 12 Billiards – 8 (2005, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2017, 2018, 2022) Snooker – 4 Asian Snooker Title (6 Reds) – 2016 Asian Snooker Title (15 Reds) – 2019, 2021 Asian Team Snooker Title (2017) National Championships - 34 Junior National Billiards – 7 Junior National Snooker – 4 Senior National Billiards – 10 Senior National Snooker (15 Reds) – 9 Senior National Snooker (6 Reds) – 4

English Billiards English billiards, called simply billiards in the United Kingdom and in many former British colonies, is a cue sport that combines the aspects of carom billiards and pool. Two (one white and one yellow) and a red are used. Each player or team us ...

World Billiards Championship (English billiards) The World Billiards Championship is an international cue sports tournament in the discipline of English billiards, organised by World Billiards, a subsidiary of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA). In its various forms ...

: 2012 , 2014

Awards and honours

, India's third highest civilian honour, 2018 *

, India's highest sporting honour, 2005–06 *

Rajyotsava Prashasti The Rajyotsava Prashasti or Rajyotsava Awards, the second highest civilian honor of the Karnataka state of India are conferred annually by the Karnataka Government on the occasion of the establishment of the state on 1 November celebrated as t ...

, Karnataka's second highest civilian honour, 2007. * Karnataka's "

Kempegowda Award The Kempegowda Award or Nadaprabhu Kempegowda Award is a civilian award presented annually by Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Bengaluru, Karnataka, India. The award nomination is based on the notable contributions of civilians, in th ...

", 2007. *

Ekalavya Award The Ekalavya Award is given by the several state government including Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana etc. The award is given to native players for outstanding performance in sports or even education by few states like Rajasthan Rajasthan ...

, Karnataka's highest sporting honour, 2007 * Vision of India's "International Indian" Award, 2005. * Senior Sportsperson of the Year, 2005 * The Sports Writers' Association of Bangalore Award, 2005 * The Bangalore University Sportsperson of the Year, 2005 * The Hero India Sports Award, 2004 * The Rajeev Gandhi Award, 2004 * The

, 2004 * The Indo-American Young Achiever's Award, 2003 * The Sports Star Sportsperson of the Year, 2003

References

External links

Pankaj Advani
at ''worldsnooker.com'' *
Pankaj Advani's bio at BilliardsForum
{{DEFAULTSORT:Advani, Pankaj 1985 births Living people Indian snooker players Indian players of English billiards Sindhi people Recipients of the Khel Ratna Award Sportspeople from Bangalore Sportspeople from Pune Recipients of the Padma Shri in sports Recipients of the Arjuna Award World champions in English billiards Asian Games medalists in cue sports Cue sports players at the 2002 Asian Games Cue sports players at the 2006 Asian Games Cue sports players at the 2010 Asian Games Indian expatriates in Kuwait Asian Games gold medalists for India Medalists at the 2006 Asian Games Medalists at the 2010 Asian Games Cue sports players from Karnataka Recipients of the Padma Bhushan in sports Recipients of the Rajyotsava Award 2007 Competitors at the 2013 World Games 20th-century Indian people 21st-century Indian people