5th July, Kaohsiung: 2015 AMF World Cup champion, Wu Siu Hong took an early lead by topping the Men's Open Masters qualifying standings of the 17th Koahsiung International Open Bowling Championships underway at Southern Bowling Centre.
In very extremely tricky conditions at the 28-lane centre, Wu, who won the Men's title in 2008 at Happy Bowling Centre in Koahsiung, registered a splendid 704 three-game series but managed only 588 on his second attempt for a six-game aggregate of 1292 to take the lead in the overseas pool.
ABF Tour Macau 2017 fourth runner-up, Dhruv Sarda of India leapfrog from sixth to second position with 1241 after posting an improved 630 series to add to his other 611 series.
Two-time Macau-China Open and 2014 Asian Games singles gold medallist, Yannaphon Larpapharat of Thailand trailed in third with 1220 while Wu's compatriot, Tony Wong finished fourth with 1217.
Wu Siu Hong for topping the Men's Open overseas pool
Debutant, Xavier Tan of Singapore, who topped the Youth Open qualifying table, did well to round out the top five with 1206.
Wicky Yeung qualified in sixth position with 1203, Eric Tseng in eighth with 1194 and Rickle Kam in 11th with 1093. Lau Kwun Ho and Mike Chan has yet to make two series. The defending champion is Michael Mak.
In the local pool, Taiwanese spinners are relishing the conditions and registering much higher scores than the overseas hook-ball qualifiers. Tsai Yin-Hao topped the standings with 1407 ahead of Wu Hao-Ming in second with 1375. Tao Kuan-Wei took third spot with 1357.
All 12 local qualifiers have surpassed the 1300-mark as Chen Chang-Yen occupying 12th position with 1302. The top 12 local qualifiers, top 12 overseas qualifiers, top 11 qualifiers from the mixed pool and top 3 qualifiers from the desperado squad together with the defending champion will bowl two rounds of 8 games each on July 7 and 8. The top 6 finishers at the end of the two rounds will advance to the stepladder finals.
Meanwhile, debutant Bianca Tofilou and Angela Boswell of New Zealand occupied the top two spots in the Ladies' Open overseas qualifying table with 1236 and 1135 respectively.
2017 ABF Tour Macau leg second runner-up, Filomena Choi of Macau and Fiona Yew of Singapore tied third spot with 1133. Milki Ng finished third in the mixed pool with 1016 while Chan Shuk Han bowled only one series.
Tsai Hsin-Yi led the local pool with 1282, just three pins ahead of compatriot, Pan Yu-Fen in second with 1279. Wang Ya-Ting took third spot with 1262 while Cho Chia-Chi and Chang Yin-Chih completed the top five with 1261 and 1238 respectively.
The top 10 local qualifiers, top 10 overseas qualifiers and the top 9 qualifiers from the mixed pool together with the defending champion will bowl two rounds of 8 games each on July 7 and 8. The top 6 finishers at the end of the two rounds will advance to the stepladder finals.
Milki Ng finishing third in the mixed pool
Qualifying will end tomorrow, July 6 and the ladies will kick off their Round 1 finals on July 7 at 1.30pm local time and the men at 7.00pm. The ladies will resume with their Round 2 on July 8 at 9.00am and the men at 12.30pm.
The top 16 Asian men and top 16 Asian women from the final results will qualify for the third leg of the 2017 ABF Tour - Chinese Taipei which will be held at the same bowling centre on July 9. Sporcast will broadcast LIVE commencing at 3.00pm local time.
Photos by Terence Yaw in Kaohsiung, Chinese Taipei.
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