Singles and Doubles Advancers at IBF World Championships -- November 9, 2021
The top 32 men's and women's singles and doubles teams advanced to a unique match-play format at the IBF World Championships in Dubai.
The top 32 men and women advanced to the match-play extravaganza at the IBF World Championships in Dubai. Saturday’s qualifying scores carried into today’s five games of singles.
Kelly Kulick of the United States led the women’s field. She averaged over 247 for her ten games and fired 265-279 the last two games to surpass England’s Verity Crawley. The reigning world champion, Danielle McEwan of the United States, climbed into 23rd with a final push of 237-221-244 after finding herself outside the top-32 on Saturday.
Sweden’s Jesper Svensson only shot 1,243 during today’s block, which dropped his average from 269 all the way down to 258.8. (I hope my extreme sarcasm was clear.) Team USA’s AJ Johnson finished 31st, just eight pins ahead of a 32/33rd place tie. You can find the complete standings on StrikeCloud.com.
The top 32 doubles teams were decided on Sunday. Svensson and his partner, Pontus Andersson, led the men’s division, while Cherie Tan and New Hui Fen helped Singapore earn the women’s top seed. Here are all of the doubles advancers:
The advancers will be divided into four pools. Instead of a traditional bracket or round-robin format, a modified form of group play will be used. Here are the rules from StrikeCloud’s Instagram post above.
Each team will play one game against the other seven teams in their group
3 points for a win, 1 for a tie, 0 for a loss
The top 2 teams from each group will advance to the quarter finals
As I noted in a Twitter exchange with Jeff Richgels, I think this format is really, really cool. It’s going to be a ton of fun to watch!
However, I do think it adds an unnecessary layer of "randomness" and chaos. Anything can happen in match play, and the best bowlers don’t necessarily win. If Svensson, who led singles and doubles qualifying, draws a few hot hands, which is entirely possible on this high-scoring oil pattern, he could be out before the quarter finals.
For a world bowling tournament, I think the format should allow the best bowlers to rise to the top. The format should more closely resemble the 56-game gauntlet of a US Open versus a fun, weekend eliminator — let the scores shake themselves out over the course of a long format.
With all that said, this format still looks incredibly compelling and I can’t wait to watch as much of the next few rounds as possible!