The winners of the National Junior and Youth Championships were honoured recently at a presentations night also marking the end of the MTBA Middlesea League.
The U-16 champions are Matthew Cossai and Cynthia Duca and the U-23 championship winners are Rankin Luke Camilleri and Bernadette Carannante.
The association, aided by training facilities provided by the Eden SuperBowl, is dedicated to nurturing youngsters in the sport starting with involvement in the SkolaSport scheme.
Both championships attracted a keen field of bowlers competing over two qualifying rounds and finishing in a best-of-three final between the top two.
The top six in round two were Cossai, James Vassallo, Matthew Mangion, Ryan Grima, Gabriel Borg and Karl Sammut.
The girl qualifiers were Luisa Buttigieg, Duca, Sabrina D'Ema-nuele, Jennifer Grech, Christabel Grima and Naomi Bugeja.
Cossai continued to bowl strongly in round two, winning three of his five encounters to stay in first place. Vassallo won two games and drew one to take second place and secure a berth in the final. Third place went to the promising Grima.
Cossai took the first game in the final with a good 204 against a 175 from Vassallo. Game two ended in a 159-all draw, but Cossai then claimed the title with a 175-144 clincher in game three.
Duca, on her part, picked up four wins from five second-round games but was kept out of the top spot by Buttigieg. She also won four games but scored higher. Third place went to D'Emanuele.
Duca went on to win the final against Buttigieg in two straight games, 150-164 and 166-180.
Camilleri stood out as the superior player in the Youth Championship, playing to a great 200.3 average over his 16 games to go through in first place.
He rolled impressive high games of 259, 235, and 223 for a 3,205 total, putting him 163 ahead of Mauro Anastasi (3,042). Justin Caruana Scicluna qualified in third place on 2,928 pins. Also through to round two were Nathan Brimmer, Dean Micallef and Ramon Casha.
In Round Two, Camilleri won his first four games to scoop some very handy bonus points that kept him in first place. Anastasi also retained his top position after three wins.
The other in the stepladder finals was Brimmer. He met Anastasi in the first game and the latter came through it with a crushing 246-179 victory to earn his place in the final against Camilleri.
The Anastasi-Camilleri encounter was a closer affair. Camilleri emerged victorious with a 191-171 win.
Supremacy in the women's section was contested from day one between sisters Tiziana and Bernadette Carannante. They came through their 16 qualifying games in first and second place respectively.
Anne Marie Bonello was third. The others to qualify were Stephanie Said, Jade Cosaitis and Duca, the junior champion.
The round robin saw Bernadette taking over the lead from Tiziana thanks to excellent scores of 244 and 261.
Tiziana had to settle for second place while Said improved to third and a place in the stepladder after a 100% win record from her five games.
A 169-136 win for Tiziana against Said meant she would meet her sister in the final. Bernadette's high-rolling from the round robin games held up and she took the title with a clear 224-165 victory.