Olympics is not everything: Pankaj Advani

March 28, 2015 12:07 am | Updated 12:07 am IST - NEW DELHI:

Pankaj Advani

Pankaj Advani

Even as snooker is vying for an appearance in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, 12-time World billiards and snooker champion Pankaj Advani feels that taking part in the once-in-four-year affair may not be the only path to achieve sporting greatness.

Advani, who gave up playing professional snooker in UK to resume his amateur career, said taking part in the Olympics might not be the ultimate achievement for every sportsperson. “I think our country is too obsessed with Olympics. If you say Olympics is the biggest event I cannot agree with you because it is an event that happens once in four years. You mean to say that an athlete should continue to train for four years so that he gets a medal in the Olympics,” Advani, who was here to participate in the RKG Open Snooker Series, told The Hindu . “I think it is about the consistency of an athlete, it is about how often you win titles and how dominating you are in your field. That actually defines greatness. Olympic is a mega event, it is a great stage to be on and it is good to be part of it. I do not think it is the be-all of all sports.

“When Roger Federer was asked if he would prefer winning the Wimbledon or the Olympics, he said ‘I would prefer winning the Wimbledon over the Olympics any day’.

“We would love to be there with cue sports as part of the Asian Games and the Olympics, but life goes on,” added Advani.

Advani, who turns 30 this year, was happy to be back in India. “After two years, I realised that this is not my thing. I was missing family, staying (out) six to eight months in a year. I could not see myself doing this for a long time. My main purpose of going there was to improve as a player and I had improved in those two years... If you look at the results, it shows — I won a lot of titles last year,” said Advani, who won the World 6-Red championship last year to make a world record of winning world titles in all formats of billiards and snooker.

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