Gillian strikes as M’sia meet two-gold target at Asian Youth bowling c’ship
KUCHING: Malaysia achieved its two- gold medal target as the 20th Asian Youth Tenpin Bowling Championships came to a close at Megalanes Sarawak, E-Mart Batu Kawa yesterday.
Delivering the gold for the national team on the final day of competition was 20- yearold Gillian Lim Siew Giok who fought all the way in the Masters stepladders.
Having qualified as the third ranked bowler, Gillian beat second ranked Charlene Lim of Singapore 200-191 in the semi-fi nals.
She stayed focused in the fi nal against top ranked South Korean Shin Hyebin, winning the first game 200-184 and second game 184-164 for the Masters gold.
In the Boys Masters stepladders, second ranked Muhammad Hafiz Zainuddin disposed of third ranked Moon Hayeong of South Korea 224-165 in the semi-fi nals.
He edged top ranked Singaporean Xavier Teo 225- 224 in the first game but was unfortunate to lose narrowly 202- 208 in the second game to settle for the silver medal.
Malaysian Tenpin Bowling Congress ( MTBC) secretary Maradona Chok gave away the prizes.
Singapore topped the six- day championship with six gold and three bronze medals, followed by Malaysia with two gold, four silver and two bronze medals and Philippines came in third overall with one gold, one silver and one bronze medals, followed by Macau (1- 0- 0), South Korea ( 0- 4- 4) and Australia ( 0-1- 0).
Other teams Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Thailand and Bahrain went home empty-handed.
Meanwhile, Malaysian team manager Robert Lu expressed satisfaction with the team’s performance but felt that they could have done better.
“I am happy with the overall performance of the team and that we have achieved our twogold target.
“Hopefully the team will learn from here and not be complacent at times that they really needed to be very focused.
“Although the girls are young rookies, they have done well to win the two gold medals and fi nish as the girls overall champions,” said Lu who is also MTBC vice president and Amateur Tenpin Bowling Of Sarawak vice president.
“Thecoacheswillheadbackhome to work on their shortcomings. We had the best of Asia’s youth bowlers in this championships although there were only 10 teams.
“I would like to congratulate the Singapore team for a very successful outing in Kuching,” added Lu.