Snooker Player Vafaei Among Last 16 at English Open

Iranian professional snooker player Hossein Vafaei won a dramatic final frame to beat English rival Stuart Bingham 4-3 and reach the last 16 of the Dafabet English Open in Barnsley.

According to Worldsnooker.com, Vafaei looked in full control as he took the first three frames with a top break of 61, but Bingham recovered to 3-3 with top runs of 104 and 58.

Bingham led 43-5 in the decider but Vafaei clawed his way back, helped by flukes on the last red and the blue. It came down to the last two balls and Vafaei converted superb pots on the pink and black to set up a match with Andrew Higginson.

Born in southern city of Abadan, Vafaei, 23, is the first Iranian professional snooker player in the history of the game. His attempts to travel to the UK to qualify for the major tournaments on the snooker calendar were denied due to visa problems, but he gained a UK visa in February 2015.

In 2011, he won the World Amateur Snooker Championship at the age of 17, which made him the youngest ever winner of the tournament. In 2012, he won ACBS Asian Under-21 Snooker Championship. Later, he won the title at the 2014 IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship.