A new Star in the East?
Asia's most promising junior players are gathering in Pune, India to contest the 2009 Asian Under 21 Championship.
The 2009 Asian Junior Championship runs from 11-19 April in India and the winner willbe nominated for a place on the 2009-10 WSA Main Tour.China start as red hot favourites, having claimed the title for the past two years.
This year's contenders for glory are Li Yuan, last year's runner up to Li Hang; Cao Yupeng, who recently lost 5-2 to Stuart Pettman in the Wildcard Round of the China Open; Lu Chengwie from Shanxi; and Anda Zhang (pictured), who has been honing his skills all season on the PIOS.
Thailand, five times previous winners, to China's three, will be hoping to get their name
on the honours board again. In fact only Moh Keen Ho from Malaysia has broken the
China-Thai stranglehold on the event, which was first held in 1993.
Thailand pin their hopes on Thanawat Thirapong, but India, the host country think they
can cause an upset if their squad who are coached by Indian Billiards Legend Devendra Joshi; can overcome the pressure of being the home favourites.
India's players are Shravan Mohta, Shahbaz Khan, Vivek Chopra, Aditya Deshpande, Pushpinder Singh and Manish Jain,
The dark horse who could take the title away from the traditional favourites is Soheil Vahedi (pictured) from Iran.Vahedi played supremely well in the 2008 IBSF World Championship in Austria last
November, reaching the semi finals, before eventually being edged out 7-5 by the experienced former pro Colm Gilcreest from Ireland.
Vahedi's team mate Amir Sarkhosh also showed promise at the World Championships in Austria and will be looking to cause an upset.
Qatar send two of the three Obaidly brothers to represent them and both are very experienced in international events and have benefited from coaching by ten times world billiards champion Mike Russell, at the Academy in Doha.
