Finns set the pace in Boys Trios event at 20th European Youth Championships

Mikko Hirvonen, Perttu Jussila, Mikael Tuomisalo, Juuso Tiainen and Tony Ranta from Finland rolled games of 1088, 975 and 1000 to lead Squad 1/2 in the Boys Trios event at the 20th European Youth Championships in Thessaloniki, Greece with 3063 pinfall total and an average of 204.20.

Ranta (r.), who led the 153-player boys field in All Events after 12 of 18 games, rolled 254, 247 and 236 for the squad-best 737 series. He has a 3452 15-game pinfall total and an average of 230.13.

Defending champion Sweden had a slow start into the team event.

Trios gold medalists Johan Sörensen, Kim Ojala, Johan Hellden and their team mates Marcus Berndt (far left), who was on the team in 2006, and Joachim Karlsson, posted games of 947 and 960 before they finished with a huge 1089 game to beat the Finns for the high game by one pin.

Their 2996 pinfall total propelled the Swedes into second place with 2996 pinfall total and an average of 199.73.

Trailing Sweden by ten pins to sit in third place is Israel with Doubles champions Aviv Alfital and Ben Fishler and their team mates Ori Sonnenschein, Oron Cohen and Dor Speizman.

The Israelis had games of 992, 1005 and 989 for 2986 pinfall total and an average of 199.07. Fishler (second from right) led the way with 664 including a 257 in the last game to sit in second place in All Events with 219.33 average, trailing Ranta by 162 pins.

England with Matt Miller, Philip Manning, Arron Machin, Andrew Jones and Matt Chamberlain is in fourth place thanks to high score in game #3. The English boys had a bad start into the event with 874, then improved to 947 before they finished the set with a huge 1076 for 2872 pinfall total and an average of 193.13.

Rounding out the top 5 is the team from Cyprus. Eric Evripidou, Kyriakos Pittasii, Stavros Theofanous, Andreas Christoforou and Dimitrios Ioannidis had games of 1014, 897 and 961 for 2872 and an average of 191.47.


Boys Team Results

Boys All Events