On another eventful day of close encounter, More made late charge to overcome P Sawant 47-55, 33-55, 72-47, 56-16, 49-38 in the best-of-five frames contest in the first round of the qualifiers.

More set the trend for tight contests as fancied Rovin D’Souza was stretched before beating Manan Agarwal 78-50, 61-45, 59-65, 64-43. Amal Mehta of Khar Gymkhana, Amit Sapru and A. Rahman also dropped a frame before advancing to the second round.

National champion Pankaj Advani will lead an elite field of cueists where the main draw will include Aditya Mehta, Manan Chandra, Sourav Kothari, Aloke Kumar, Yasin Merchant and Rupesh Shah, who finished in that order in the national championships, and junior national champion Shravan Mohta.

This elite group of eight will be joined by four wild cards Devendra Joshi, Ashok Shandilya, Sarang Shroff and Rafath Habib of Karnataka apart from eight qualifiers.

The field of 20 in the main draw will include four groups of five players each with the top two players in each group qualifying for the quarter-finals.

The winner will receive Rs. 60,000, while the runner-up will earn Rs. 30,000. In addition, the cash prize for the highest break is Rs. 5,000.

The qualifying rounds, which began on Tuesday will conclude on March 2, while the main draw will be held from March 4 to 9. The semi-finals will be held on March 8 and the final on March 9.