Shoot­ing Stars record­ed their sec­ond shutout of the Na­tion­al Pool League (NPL) 8 Ball Pre­mier Di­vi­sion com­pe­ti­tion on Wednes­day when they de­feat­ed UD As­sas­sins five games to ze­ro at the Up­per Deck Sports Bar in St James, Port-of-Spain.

The ‘Stars’, cap­tained by Naz­im Mo­hammed, did not leave much to chance, as on­ly one game went the dis­tance. In the open­er, Taariq Mo­hammed was drawn to play As­sas­sins’ Marc Hospedales. The vis­it­ing Mo­hammed (T) took the first frame, lost the sec­ond, then went up 3-1 be­fore Hospedales pulled with­in one frame, but Mo­hammed closed out the game in the sixth rack for a 4-2 win. The sec­ond game, be­tween Stars’ Ra­jeev Ma­haraj and Richard Sookram, was the most com­pet­i­tive. Sookram took a 2-1 lead with wins in the first and third frames, but Ma­haraj took frames four and five for a 3-2 turn­around. Sookram fought back with a win in the sixth rack but lost the de­cider to see the hosts trail by two games ear­ly on.

In the dou­bles, Rudy Ram­baran and Shakar Beep­han took on Nigel St Clair and Bri­an Mc­Cune, with Ram­baran and Beep­han tak­ing an ear­ly 2-nil lead. The hosts hit back with a ta­ble run in the third, but that was their on­ly win on the night. With the match al­ready won, the fourth game was a one-sided af­fair as the Shoot­ing Stars cap­tain, Mo­hammed (N), de­feat­ed his op­po­nent, Mitch Thomas, in four straight frames. An­war Baksh, aka Pre­si, closed out the rout with an­oth­er dom­i­nat­ing four-one re­sult against Lley­ton Au­guste. The pair split the first two frames, with Au­guste win­ning the sec­ond rack, but that is as close as it would get.

The win takes the Gas­par­il­lo-based Shoot­ing Stars up one spot on the stand­ings to sev­enth with six wins and six loss­es, while the UD As­sas­sins are now three and nine and oc­cu­py the eleventh spot on the thir­teen-team ta­ble.

Ri­vals con­tin­ue to lead the stand­ings af­ter a close­ly fought en­counter with the Orinoco Blood A team from San­gre Grande. Play­ing at home, the Ri­vals took their win/loss record to eleven wins and one loss with a 3-2 win at Bil­liards Place, Aranguez. Unit­ed Stars, al­so with a record of 11 and one, stayed in con­tention with a 4-1 against the Mer­ce­nar­ies. The Mer­ce­nar­ies are third, one match be­hind, with ten wins from twelve match­es. Fourth-placed Cen­tral Pre­mier Pool Club round off the top four with nine wins and three loss­es. Cen­tral PPC de­feat­ed the Princes Town Un­der­dogs 4-1. The Un­touch­ables hold on to fifth spot af­ter down­ing the cel­lar-placed Scotchie’s Spar­tans 4-1. Al­so on Wednes­day, the Cen­tral Stars got the bet­ter of their cross-town neigh­bours, the Rox­bury Hus­terz, 3-2 to re­main in sixth place in the stand­ings. The Stars of Cen­tral, like the Shoot­ing Stars, have six wins and six loss­es, and both teams, re­mark­ably, have an iden­ti­cal win/loss record in games with 31 wins and 29

loss­es. The Ken­ny’s Sports Bar-based Cen­tral Stars are ahead of their name­sake in frames, with the Cen­tral team boast­ing 180 frames won to 170 lost. Shoot­ing Stars, on the oth­er hand, have 157 frames won to 167 lost.

The Sikar­i­oz Bil­liards Club, who are eighth on the ta­ble with a record of five wins and sev­en loss­es, were on a round 13 bye. The fi­nal round of match­es, be­fore the Christ­mas break, takes place on Wednes­day at venues across T&T.

De­cem­ber 17 Pre­mier Di­vi­sion fix­tures

Shoot­ing Stars vs Sikar­i­oz Bil­liards Club at Pyra­mid, Gas­par­il­lo

The Un­touch­ables vs UD As­sas­sins at Reno’s, San­gre Grande

Scotchie’s Spar­tans vs Unit­ed Stars at Shindig, Curepe

The Mer­ce­nar­ies vs Rox­bury Hus­tlerz at Lucky’s, Williamsville

Cen­tral Stars vs Orinoco Blood A at Ken­ny’s, Ch­agua­nas

Ri­vals vs Princes Town Un­der­dawgs at Bil­liards Place, Aranguez

Cen­tral Pre­mier Pool Club - Bye