Exotic Holidays 'C' clinch title by a point

Exotic Holidays 'C' led by Mohamed Nabeel, pipped Aitken Spence Travels 'A' by 1 point, to lift the 17th Travel Trade Sports Club (TTSC) Bowling Championships 2018, held on Friday (6) at the Strikes Cosmic Bowling Centre, Excel World. It was sponsored for the first time by Pearl of Asia.

An unprecedented 74 teams from 28 member firms participated. After the 74 teams did 1 Round of Bowling (3 players each), the 27 top scoring teams advanced to the semifinals.

From the 27 semifinalists 9 top scoring teams advanced to the final. Classic Travel (343), Aitken Spence Travels 'B' (421) Emirates 'A' (365), Ceylon Roots 'A' (348), Walkers Tours 'A' (374) , Exotic Holidays 'C' (344), Emirates 'C' (337), Luxe Asia 'B' (last year’s Silver Winner-403) and Aitken Spence Travels 'A' (last year’s Bronze winner-356).

Defending Champions, Luxe Asia 'A', sans their top player Chaminda Dias came up to the semifinals but, failed to qualify for the top 9. Luxe Asia 'B' (360) finished 5th and Ceylon Roots (371) finished 4th.

Bronze: Aitken Spence Travels 'B'- 399 points [Sasindu Welaratne- 121, Suresh Sathyanathen- 102, Goshan Maduranga- 176 (Top Scorer in the final round)]

Silver: Aitken Spence Travels 'A'- 428 points (Lalin Sumanasinghe- 137, Sameer Jansen- 152, Dian Jansz- 139) Gold: Exotic Holidays 'C'- 429 points (Mohamed Nabeel- 130, Umesh Anushanka- 131, Hasitha Hettiarachchi- 168) Awards were presented by Pearl of Asia General Manager Thariq Sukoor (Chief Guest), Pearl of Asia Consultant-former TTSC President Jayantha de Silva (Guest of Honour), TTSC President Bonita Odayar, TTSC General SecretaryTournament Coordinator Dilshan Gnanapragasam.