Singaporean makes good debut
5th April, Riyadh: 2009 Qatar Open champion, Remy Ong of Singapore, made good progress in his debut at the 4th Saudi Ineternational Open Bowling Tournament by topping Squad 4 on Sunday at Universal Bowling Centre. Ong, who struggled in the earlier Squad 3 with only 1445 over the 8-game qualifying round, started his next squad with 226, 232 and 191 but had a setback on a low game of 169 in the fourth.
But the 32-year-old recovered with 202, 245, 224 and 213 in the second half to end the round with 1702 and topping the squad. Hong Kong’s Wu Siu Hong, who also struggled in his earlier attempt, posted 1667 to take up second behind Ong.
Kuwait’s Basel Al-Anzi of Kuwait finished third with 1647 ahead of his compatriot, Khaled Al-Dubyyan fourth with 1641 while Mansour Al-Awami of Qatar rounded up the top 5 with 1620.
“I was totally lost in my first squad as I really don’t know where to bowl,” said Ong, who finished third and fourth in the Dubai Open and H.H. Emir Cup in February this year.
“Fortunately, I slowly got used to the lanes here and managed a good scoreline. I’m not toally disappointed not to make the top 4 for a bye into the Semi-final second round but I’ll get 130 pins bonus as fifth qualifier for the first round semi-final.”
Two squads were contested on Monday with American Patrick Healey topping Squad 5 with 1756 and Korean PBA, Kong Jin-Seok taking Squad 6 with 1693. Squad 2 and 3 leader, Biboy Rivera of the Philippines topped the overall standings with 1778.
Squad 1 leader, Andrew Frawley of Australia, finished second with 1768 ahead of Healey in third. Kuwait Open first runnerup, Zulmazran Zulkifli of Malaysia took the fourth and final spot with 1743 for the Round 1 bye.
Ong finished fifth ahead of newly-crowned Kuwait Open and three-time European Tour champion, Osku Palermaa of Finland sixth with 1696. Squad 6 leader, Kong ended up in seventh with Kuwait’s Mohammed Kamel eighth.
Two more squads remained in tomorrow’s final day of qualifying. The top 4 will earn bye into Round 2 semi-finals while positions 5 to 26 will contest the Round 1 semi-finals joined by the top 2 qualifiers from Squads 1 and 2, two from desperado squad and two best local qualifier.
The field will be cut to top 12 to join the four seeded qualifiers in the leaderboard for the two-games total pinfalls elimination Round 2 semi-finals. Thereafter, a series of unsual elimination stages will be held to eventually determine the champion.
Detailed scores: Squad 4 | Qualifying Standings | Photo Album.
Photos by Terence Yaw in Riyadh.