In the four-hour match at the halfway stage on Friday night Shutt led 723-530 after having wiped out an 80-point deficit by making a break of 197, and on Saturday frittered it away as Rehani got a 109 and 44. After that the match, with neither managing to stay at the table long enough to make a big break, went neck and neck till Shutt notched up a 105 racing 80 points ahead.

With Rehani continuing to miss sitters and failing to capitalise on easy openings, Shutt drove the nail into his coffin by making a break of 147 on his last visit to win 1269-1096.

Shutt, who turns 21 on Monday, said later he wasnot satisfied with the way he played and that he was capable of much better. He said he did fear at a stage when Rehani was in lead that the match would slip from his grip, ``but he missed a lot of chances towards the end and I got up two centuries''.

Nalin Patel of Mumbai made mincemeat of Ishtmit Malik by defeating him by a margin of 1277 points. Though Nalin was extremely inconsistant, averaging only 24.2, he made the highest break of the championship so far, and his highest as a professional, 310. Malik just meandered around, his highest break in four hours totalling all of 45 points, and miserably lost 562-1739.

Peter Sheehan who led 581-504 overnight against Eugene Hughes, placed 10 ranks higher than him, Sheehan, continued from where he had left off, expanding the lead with breaks of 111, 103, 137, 213 and 188. He won comprehensively 1726-791.

Results (2nd round): Chris Shutt bt Mukesh Rehani 1269 (197, 111, 118, 105, 147)-1096 (109); Arun Agrawal bt Alok Kumar 1155 (103, 104)-983 (98);Nalin Patel bt Ishtmit Malik 1739 (171, 144, 310)-562 (45); Peter Sheehan bt Eugene Hughes 1726 (151, 111, 103, 137, 213, 188)-791 (89); Rupesh Shah leads Bob Close 670 (125, 133)-349 (79).