Aditya Mehta grabbed the bronze in snooker singles final after losing to Hong Kong's Fu Ka Chun Marco 1-4 in the semi-finals to bring bring down curtains on the Indian challenge in cue sports with a medal in the Asian Games on Saturday.
Aditya, who lost to his more fancied Hong Kong rival Fu 20-62, 7-60, 68-55, 15-59 and 21-71, secured a bronze as one of the two losing semifinalists to win the fourth medal from the green baize games.
The other medals in cue sports were claimed by Pankaj Advani (gold in billiards), men's snooker team (silver) and Alok Kumar (bronze in 8-ball pool singles).
The 25-year-old Mumbai-based Aditya was the last remaining medal hope for India in the cue games after stroking his way past Singapore's Ang Boon Chin 4-3 in a close quarter final tie late yesterday but could not produce the same magic today against Fu.
Aditya, who has been trying to break into the professional league through the qualifiers in England, was down 0-2 before he raised hopes of a fine fight-back by pulling one back to trail 1-2.
But, the Hong Kong cueist showed excellent touch on the table to wrap up the last two frames and enter the last four stage.
Fu took the opening frame with a top break of 35 while Aditya's best run was a meager seven. In the second frame, the Hong Kong player's sequence of 59 buried the Indian.
Aditya made a timely break of 32 to win the third frame 68-55 in which his rival had the better break of 35.
But, Aditya faltered when there was a chance to attack the balls in the fourth frame and Fu ran up small breaks to clinch it for a 3-1 lead before burying the Indian with a run of 50 in the fifth frame to wrap up the tie.
Fu would meet China's Ding Junhui, who edged out Dechwat Poomjaeng of Thailand 4-3 in the other semifinal, in the gold medal match. The Thai also got a bronze.
