Hong Kong shake off the rust to earn Worlds spot at Asian Tenpin Bowling Championships
- City’s team, which has struggled amid Covid-19 restrictions, did not win a medal but men’s team qualifies for Kuwait showpiece in October
- Singapore, Malaysia and Korea top the overall medal tally at South China Athletics Association as event comes to close on Wednesday
Hong Kong’s men’s tenpin bowling team earned a World Championships spot despite finishing empty-handed at the Asian Championships in Causeway Bay on Wednesday.
Tony Wong Kwan-yuen, 27, and Michael Mak Cheuk-yin were both in the top 16 of the Masters event at South China Athletics Association, with the former finishing seventh overall with a total score of 3,921 points, while Mak finished 15th with 3,637.
Malaysia’s Muhd Rafiq Ismail – champion in the trios, team of five, and all-events competitions, defeated South Korea’s Park Geon-ha 488-450 in the stepladder final to win his fourth gold medal at the regional showcase.
“We cannot expect much from our team because it’s the first event they’ve had since returning to the international battlefield after nearly three years,” Tenpin Bowling Association chairwoman Vivien Lau Chiang-chu said.
“I’m glad that they managed to finish in the top five as a team to book a place in the [IBF] World Mixed Championships [in Kuwait in October], which is one of our main events to gain points to meet the elite sports’ benchmark of the Hong Kong Sports Institute.”
The top 10 men’s and women’s teams qualified for the Worlds, with Hong Kong finishing fourth on 28,028 points, based on the top five scorers from four events.