Qatar’s Muzamel Hussain in action during the quarter-finals of the third chance qualification draw yesterday.

By Sports Reporter/Doha

Three chances and numerous back-to-back games later, 12 players qualified for the main draw of the 2015 WPA World 9-Ball Championship at Doha’s Al Arabi Sports Club yesterday.
The first stage of the tournament churned 128 players in a hellish draw to throw a dozen players in the deep end of World 9-Ball. The second stage, also featuring 128 players, begins tomorrow and will culminate in a race-to-13 final on September 18.
Matey Ullah of Norway, Francisco Felicilda and Jeffrey Ignacio of the Philippines, and Wu Kum of Chinese Taipei were the first ones to get through to the second stage after winning their respective qualification groups in the first chance.
Ullah beat Qatar’s Khamis Obaidly in the final, and that was the closest a local player came to getting through the qualification rounds.
Liu Ching and Chao Fong of Chinese Taipei, Kuwait’s Omar al-Shaheen, and the Philippines’ Oliver Medenilla filled up four spots through the second chance draw.
Fahad Khalaf of Bahrain, Cheng Yu of Chinese Taipei, Kuwait’s Abdullah al-Yousef and Japan’s Yukio Akagariyama were the last four through to the second stage. Yesterday, Muzamel Hussain and Mohamed al-Zahed, both from Qatar, lost out in the semi-finals of the third chance qualification draw.
Qatari participation in the USD200,000 world championship will continue with Waleed Majed at the forefront of it.
Majed, who is the highest-ranked player in the world from the Mena region at 24, has a direct entry into the second stage and will have momentum on his side.
He recently won the Middle East Championship in Dubai and will certainly be looking to better his 2014 performance when he became the first player from Qatar to reach the last 16 stage at the world championship. En route he also beat former champion and current world number two Darren Appleton of Great Britain
However, apart from Majed, the hosts will be represented by Bashar Hussain, Mohamed bin Ali, Ali Obaidly, Mohanna Obaidly, Abdulatif Fawal, Mohamed Saeed and Mishel Turkey.
And then there are Doha-based Filipinos Antonio Gabica, who was the 2013 finalist in the competition, and Amir Rota, who will be of interest to the audiences at Al Arabi  Sports Club starting tomorrow.
Top of the ladder are the usual suspects Niels Feijen, the defending champion, and former champions  including Appleton and Thorsten Hohmann of Germany. Also in fray are many Filipino players, who always draw hordes of fans to the world championships.
This time, however, the two biggest draws from the Philippines, former champions Francisco Bustamante and Efren Reyes, won’t be making the trip to Doha. The official Facebook account of the tournament posted: “We don’t know the reason why, only that perhaps they had some sort of commercial commitment back home.”
Nonetheless, 11 quality players, including three qualifiers, will keep the Filipino fans entertained.
Fiejens, for his part, will be looking out to do what no other man has done in 24 years — win a second straight world 9-Ball title. The last man to do so was American Earl Strickland who won the title in 1990 and 1991.
Apart from bragging rights, there is also a small matter of USD30,000 winner’s prize money.
Now, to some quality 9-Ball action.