HANIF HASSAN

YASOTHON : Ratchapol Pu-Ob-Orm left the northeastern city of Yasothon yesterday with smiles and the only piece of silverware that had been missing from his already crowded trophy cabinet at home: the Thailand national championship.

Ratchapol, a winner of the IBSF World Championship, three world ranking tournament and two Asian Championship titles, played with great confidence on Sunday to rout two-time former national champion Issara Kachaiwong 5-1 at the JP Emerald Hotel.

With more than just 100,000-baht winner's purse at stake, Issara showed nerves to make things easier for Ratchapol to a great extent. It was announced at the start of the match that the winner of the showdown will be representing Thailand at the 2008 IBSF World Snooker Championship in Austria next month.

It was clear from early on in the encounter that Ratchapol, taking part in his first national championship after a lapse of 20 years, was in a better nick.

Ratchapol Pu-Ob-Orm shows the trophy after defeating two-time former national champion Issara Kachaiwong 5-1 at the JP Emerald Hotel in Yasothon. — HANIF HASSAN

Issara got among the balls in the first frame, but Ratchapol had a break of 64 points and then cleared yellow to black off the table to capture the opener.

The next frame was a similar story as Ratchapol once again knocked home a break of 76 to go two-up.

After the scrappy third frame that finished in Ratchapol's favour, Issara showed some signs of a recovery as a break of 56, which ended with a miserable miss on a straight red, helped him take the fourth but it did little to dent his rival's confidence.

The loss of fourth frame made Ratchapol even more eager to impress an overflowing crowd at the venue.

A frame winning run of 50 followed in the fifth and Ratchapol then took three trips to the table to wrap up the last tournament of the 2008 Professional Circuit, which was co-sponsored by CAT Telecom and SangSom.

RESULTS

Final: Ratchapol Pu-Ob-Orm beat Issara Kachaiwong 5-1 (91(64)-29, 81(76)-7, 56-46, 86(56)-1, 76(54)-4, 76-21)

Saturday night's semi-final: Issara Kachaiwong beat Dechawat Poomjang 5-3 (70-48, 56-66(65), 0-108(54), 4-110(83), 57-23, 68(61)-34, 80(71)-8, 69-19)