A dream win for England's Barrett

The Malta Open Championships were played recently at the Eden SuperBowl. More than 100 participants took part, hailing from 12 mostly European nations, and including some of the world's current top tenpin bowlers.

Countries represented included Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, England, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland, as well as an 18-strong field of local bowlers.

The format was changed this year, with a re-entry system being introduced whereby after 12 qualifying games, players could opt to play a further six-game re-entry to replace their lowest initial block of six and so improve on their qualifying position.

The changes proved popular, the chance of some extra bowling adding to the enjoyment of those participating, along with the €12,000 prize-fund up for grabs.

Initial qualification from 12 games automatically put 26 bowlers through to the four-tier final stages, and topping those was one of the latest Professional Bowling Association (PBA) exempted bowlers, Stuart Williams (England) on 2,800 pins.

Belgium's Christian Vandamme was second on 2,779 pins and in third place was a sure champion of the future, Malta's Justin Caruana Scicluna with a superb 2,735 total.

Other Maltese qualifiers in the top 26 were Sue Abela 14th, Neil Sullivan 18th and Kenneth Arpa right on the cut in 26th place.

Unfortunately, all three were eliminated before the third round, the top six being, in order, Nick Froggatt (England), Nicole Saunders (Holland), defending champion Paul Moor (England), Dominic Barrett (England), Bas Bosman (Holland) and Bo Winther (Denmark).

The six already through to the Round Robin from qualification were Williams, Vandamme and Caruana Scicluna along with Mads Sandbakken (Norway), Kim Andersson (Sweden) and Sandra Andersson (Sweden).

This stage was played over 11 head-to-head games. Only the top four would make the stepladder final matches.

Caruana Scicluna rolled some top-rate games with five way over the 200-mark (223, 235, 256, 257 and 258) and also racked up five match wins for a stack of all-important bonus points.

Sadly, low games like 155, 179, 184 and 186 dragged him down to eighth place, 130 pins adrift of the top four.

Nevertheless, he gave a dazzling display, gaining some excellent tournament experience and priceless international exposure.

The round robin leader was last year's runner-up, Barrett whose low game from the session was a 211, the high being a 259 with a flurry of major games in between. His awesome scratch total of 2,641 was boosted to 2,856 by seven win bonuses, and an abundance of high-game bonuses.

Barrett's high-scoring performance secured him a place in the final match, while the other three finalists in qualifying order were Williams, Moor and Vandamme, the defending Malta Senior champion.

Vandamme faced Moor in the first stepladder game, and the pair kept the hushed crowd on the edge of their seats, until the Belgian scooped a 229-243 win in the final frame. He then met Williams and again rose to the occasion with an excellent 211-269 game to put him in the final.

Game one saw the two bowlers measuring up each other's game, and it was not to be a high-scoring affair. Barrett took it by just nine pins (194-185).

Game two was also very cagey. After the upset in the 2008 final, this year belonged to Barrett who secured the Malta Open title with a 222-209 clincher.

2009 has been a fantastic year for Barrett so far, the 24-year-old having already been honoured as World Bowler of the Year, and claiming victory in the Australian Open, the World Tenpin Masters and also the European Championships just before his trip to Malta.

The Malta Open is sponsored by the Eden Leisure Group and organised by the Eden SuperBowl.

Air Malta are the official tournament airline and the event is also supported by the Dragonara Casino.