Indian Champion’s Win Over Malta Champion On First Day

The long awaited World Billiards championship commenced at the Great Eastern Hotel on Thursday night November 20 with one match in the system between Wilfred Axiak , Malta champion and Chandra Hirjee the Indian champion , the latter eventually retiring winner by 2273 points to 1339 ..
The match started almost in time . Axiak having the first strike was seen in action first . But when Hirjee visited the table he appeared to be a symbol of confidence .Hirjee was the dominant figure during the first 45 minutes’ play after which he lost his touch . It was during this time that Axiak put in some useful scores with breaks of 54 , 77 and 58 . His highest break for the session was 77 .
Chandra Hirjee in his eleven visits to the table in the first hour made the breaks of 61 , 98 , 50 , 63 and 131 the last one being compiled in 5 minutes and 47 ½ seconds .
In the second hour Hirjee took things easy . He scored two century breaks of 108 and 173 in the 32nd and 33rd visits to the table in 5 minutes 6 seconds and 7 minutes 27 seconds respectively .
Axiak appeared to be weak in the “In-off” play and had only 55 to his credit . At the end of the first session Hirjee led by 607 points , the score being Axiak 600 and Hirjee 1207 and 5 in play .
SECOND SESSION

The Indian Champion ex-ploited the top table in the second session also . His best break was made in the second session with 205 in 9 minutes . Axiak’s best was 136 in the 6th visit after the interval in 9 minutes 23 seconds .
Hirjee averaged 35.5 points in the first session in 34 visits against Axiak’s 17.1 in 35 visits . Hirjee’s average was 26.6 in 40 visits in the closing session to Axiak’s 18.9 in 39 visits .
The important breaks were :-
Chandra Hirjee—98 , 131 , 108 , 173 , 96 , 205 , 88 , 95 and 176 .
Wilfred Axiak—55 , 77 , 136 , 86 and 73 .


FRIDAY’S GAME
Wilson Jones(India) vs. Maung Hman(Burma) in two sessions—5-30 p.m. and 8-30 p.m.