Robert Andersson and Martin Larsen (pictured left), Sweden, led the 10 and 11th squad en route to crack the top 10 in the overall qualifying standings in the Hammer Bronzen Schietspoel Tournament 2009 Thursday evening at Dolfijn Bowling in Tilburg, Netherlands.

The 2006 World Champions in Doubles felled 1339 (Larsen) and 1307 (Andersson, right) pins over six games on dual lane condition to leap into third and seventh place, respectively.

Two women, Ghislaine van der Tol, Netherlands, and Nicki Ainge, England, remained atop the 154-player field. Van der Tol is the sole player who cracked the 1400-mark with 1418 including 48 pins handicap. Ainge is second after posting a 1382 total including handicap in Squad 9 on Thursday afternoon.

Yoan Alix (left), France, was mere six pins behind Andersson in Squad 10 with 1298, good for 8th place overall.

The Hammer Bronzen Schietspoel Tournament 2009 is the 2nd stop of the 2009 European Bowling Tour and one of the Tour's "Major" events. The tournament offers total prize fund of 62.800 Euro. The top 64 players cash with 12.000 going to the winner. Mikael Kanold, Sweden, is the defending champion.

Qualifying runs through Saturday evening, Feb. 21, with the final Squad 18 scheduled for 6 p.m. local time (GMT +1). The ultimate qualifying chance, the one-game Desperado Squad, will conclude the qualifying at 9.30 p.m.

The Hammer Bronzen Schietspoel Tournament 2009 is contested on dual lane condition. The left lane is dressed with the 46ft long pattern, the right lane with the 33ft short pattern.

A total of 64 players will advance to the finals on Sunday, Feb. 22, the top 54 qualifying leaders, the top 6 from a combined standing of Squads 1-4, who are not among the top 54, and the top 4 from the Desperado Squad. The top 8 qualifiers earn three byes, qualifiers 9-16 receive two byes and qualifiers 17-24 get one bye.

The players will be seeded into groups of four players each and will determine the champion in seven rounds over two games total pinfall. Basically the top two players plus some 'lucky losers' (rounds 1-4), advance to the next round and will be reseeded according to pinfall in the previous round.

The field will be cut from 64 to 48, 36, 24, 16, 8 and the then four, who will battle it out for the title.