Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn of Thailand clinched the 32nd Asian Snooker Championship by defeating UAE's Mohamed Sehab at the Qatar Billiards and Snooker Federation (QBSF) Academy yesterday.
The diminutive Thai, who hit the purple patch in Doha over the last week overcoming players much higher in the ranking hierarchy, continued in the same vein to register a comfortable 6-2 win over Shehab to win the continental championship.
The 27-year-old Lertsattayathorn, who goes by the nickname ‘Thorn’, had already staged huge upsets by defeating former IBSF World Champion Mohammad Asif of Pakistan and top seed and reigning IBSF World Amateur Champion Pankaj Advani of India in the quarter-finals and semi-finals respectively.
The Thai also got a two-year professional tour card from World Snooker and picked up the $1,750 prize for the maximum break of the tournament.
The champion took home $3,500 and the runner-up $1,750. The losing semi-finalists collected $500 each.
The final was pitted as a match between the experienced vs rising star. The 39-year-old Shehab has played many years in the circuit. He is the only player from UAE to reach Asian Championship final. Shehab also had two separate seasons as a professional on the main tour in 1996-1997 and 2006-2007.
Only last month Shehab had claimed gold in the West Asian Championship held in Jordan. In 2006, he had reached the final of the Asian Championship in Colombo, Sri Lanka, although he lost out 6-3 to Issara Kachaiwong. A decade later, Shehab was aiming to put it right.
On the other hand, Lertsattayathorn is a rising star in the amateur circuit and he also kept his country's proud history in the tournament intact.
In the last 31 editions of the championship, 15 times the title has gone to Thailand.
And Lertsattayathorn success made him the 11th different winner from his country, but the first since 2011.
Last year at the World
Amateurs in Egypt, Lertsattayathorn had made it through to the Last 8. In 2014, during the World Professional 6 Reds Championship in his homeland, he had sensationally reached the semifinals after eliminating Ryan Day, Mark Davis and John Higgins on route.
Yesterday, Lertsattayathorn seemed to be overawed by the situation as he lost the first frame. But then bounced back to win the next two to make it 2-1.
Shehab, won the fourth frame, but Lertsattayathorn asserted himself quickly to pocket the next four frames to win the best-of-11 frames final 6-2.

Result
Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn of Thailand  6 bt
Mohamed Shehab of UAE 2
Frames scores: 19/ 62, 53/33, 61/51, 34/47, 71/22,83/3 72/24, 73/39