Bowlers running 1-2 in Masters

JAKARTA – The Philippine male keglers remained steady through five days of SEA Games bowling competitions here, pocketing the silver in the team event late Friday then putting them in a good position to strike a possible one-two finish in the masters event yesterday morning.

Frederick Ong and Biboy Rivera are running first and second going to the final block (short oil) in the men’s masters today in the Jaya Ancol Bowling Center.

Ong, the most bemedalled Filipino bowler so far with a gold, two silvers and a bronze, topped the first block (long pattern) with 1849 pinfalls, followed by Rivera at 1806 then Malaysians Muhd Syafiq Ridhwam (1767), Zulmazran Zulfikfli (1755) then Adrian Ang (1732).

Raoul Miranda, the third Filipino entered in the masters, was at sixth at 1724.

“We’re still playing the last block but at least we’ve got a headway,” said Ong, making a big impact in his first SEA Games.

“Hopefully, we can sustain our game and it would be great if we can send two players in the stepladder finals,” said Rivera, the 2006 World Cup champion and Guangzhou Asiad gold medal winner.

The top three after the second block advance to the finals. The top player gets an outright shot at the gold with the next two knocking each other out for the second berth in the gold-medal game.

Ong and Rivera themselves led the Phl men’s team in a silver-medal finish in the team-of-five event ruled by the Malaysians with a winning score of 6241 pinfalls.

The Malaysians struck hard in a three-game stretch beginning the second to beat the Filipinos by a comfortable margin of 209.