Singapore women dominate first round

24th July, Jakarta: Singapore women dominated the first round of the Women's Open Masters finals at the 9th Indonesia International Open in which Cherie Tan and New Hui Fen finished one-two while Bahrain's Yousef Falah took pole in the men's division.  Guangzhou Asian Games silver medalist, Ivana Hie set the pace with an opening game of 233 to lead Malaysia's Jacqueline Sijore in second but her lead was short-lived as Singapore's New Hui Fen took over the running after the second game.

Another Malaysian, Esther Cheah made her bid with a big game of 264 in the third to move ahead of Hui Fen as the field settled down with the finals.

But it was Hui Fen's high games that put her back into the lead which she held for the next three games until Esther bounced back to share the lead with the Singaporean after the seventh game followed by a third Malaysian, Hee Kar Yen trailing by 6 pins.

A second Singaporean Cherie Tan then stormed home with 212, 213 and 226 to snatch pole position with 2136 at the end of the 10-game Round 1. Hui Fen settled for second with 2114 while Kar Yen hung on for third with 2109.

"I started off rather slow but after changing my bowling ball, I managed to string togther more consistent games which allowed me to finish this well," said the 22-year-old Cherie, who bagged the 2011 EBT Masters title in February,

"It'll all be back to square one tomorrow and I hope I can continue to bowl this consistently. I'm happy with my performance today and I'm also glad that all my team-mates made the next round."

Seven Singapore women contested this round and they will be joined by top seed and Hong Kong Open champion, Shayna Ng, 2007 Indonesia Open champion, Bernice Lim and Siti Shazwani of Malaysia.

Thailand's Angkana Netrviseth missed the cut 15 pins despite ending with a superb game of 242. The 18th and cut position for next round went to Singapore's Jasmine Yeong-Nathan with a total of 1908.

Meanwhile, Jason Yeong-Nathan and Bejmanin Lim were the only two Singapore men who qualified for the finals. Jason completed the round with 2036 to advance into the next round in 16th position.

Benjamin never got into his strides and ended in a dismal 30th position with 1831. Bahrain's Yousef Falah topped the round with 2259 after a keen tussle for the lead with Hong Kong's Michael Tsang.

Thailand's Surasak Manuwong stormed home to snatch second spot with 2230 as Tsang settled for third with 2197. American PBA pro, Tim Mack finished strongly to take up fourth spot with 2182 while Basel Al Anzi of Kuwait rounded up the top 5 with 2181.

UAE's Hareb Al Mansoori missed the cut by 4 pins to finish 19th position with 1999. Isaac Russell, Yannaphon Larpapharat and Wu Siu Hong from the overseas pool and Oscar, Ryan Lalisang and Harry Rachmadian from the local pool will join the top 18 for the next round.

The top 6 men and top 6 women at the end of the second round will advance into the stepladder shootout finals to determine the champion.

Detailed scores: Women's Open Round 1 Finals | Men's Open Round 1 Finals | Photo Album.

Photos by Terence Yaw in Jakarta.