Australian Girls Bring Home Medals at Asian Schools Championship
By Chris Rushton
The Australian team has returned home from the 19th Asian School Championships with two silver and two bronze medals, to finish fourth on the overall medal tally. The team’s success follows on from the medal haul at the 2017 Asian School Championship which saw Australia bring home one gold and two silvers from Malaysia.
Australia’s medal haul began on day 3 of competition with Ivy Dickinson and Emily Johnston winning silver in the girl’s doubles. The duo averaged 202 and 192 respectively to only fall 56 pins behind the eventual winners of Alena Dang and Colleen Pee of Singapore who led from start to finish in the event.
The medals kept coming on day 4 of competition, when the girl’s team of Emily Johnson, Grace Fahy, Ivy Dickinson and Jamie Phelan started strong to finish the first block of the team’s event in third. On day 5 the quartet finished off where they had started with a 778 final game to snatch the silver medal from Chinese Taipei who finished 30 pins behind the Australians.
Following the teams event and having finished 5th in the singles and doubles events, South Australian, Jamie Phelan moved into 3rd position in the All Events stepping up on the podium again on day 5 to claim her second medal of the championship.
On the final day Phelan, was joined by Amy Shoesmith, Emily Johnston, Ivy Dickinson and Grace Fahy in the Masters with Phelan continuing her outstanding form at the tournament to qualify for the stepladder finals.
In the finals, Phelan drew Grace Gella of the Philippines with the winner advancing to the gold medal match. But it wasn’t to be for the Australian, with Gella taking the match 212-205 to see Phelan win her second bronze medal of the tournament and third medal overall.
After returning home last week with the team, head coach Shane Bernhardt said the success in recent years shows how much talent exists in Australia.
“I was extremely proud of the team’s performance. There is no doubt that over the last couple of years, Australia has certainly ‘punched above its weight’ at these championships.”
“There is an enormous amount of talent in our junior ranks within Australia and in my mind is comparable to what I have witnessed from other countries at the Asian Schools Championships” Bernhardt added.
For all the final results click here.
