The 19th Malta Open came to a close at the Eden SuperBowl last week, with Swedish youth Marcus Berndt collecting the top prize money as well as the title of Malta Open champion.
Close to 100 bowlers from 12 European countries made, what is for some, a yearly pilgrimage to the Eden SuperBowl to compete in this highly popular event.
The Open started with all competitors playing two sets of six games for their 12-game qualification total. They could then opt to play a further six-game 're-entry' in order to replace their low initial series.
The top 26 in round one automatically booked their place in the final stages, joined by another four from the thrilling Desperado Squad.
Topping round one was Berndt followed by England's Stuart Williams, with local hopeful Kenneth Arpa going through in third place.
A good number of Maltese bowlers figured among the qualifiers, namely Mark Spiteri (5), Justin Caruana Scicluna (7), Sue Abela (8), Neil Sullivan (10), Rankin Camilleri (15) and Ray Falzon Reale (21).
They were joined by John Balani, who qualified from the 28-strong Desperado Squad.
In the final stages, the top four bowlers from the 30 qualifiers would earn the right to contest the Stepladder Finals.
Final Stage Three was the round-robin stage where the last 12 faced off in 11 direct confrontations.
With the top six seeds only coming into the picture at this point, and the other qualifiers having already played a varying number of games to reach this stage, anything could happen.
But it was top seed Berndt who came to the fore, winning no fewer than nine of his 11 matches to easily go through as the number one.
Second place went to Matt Chamberlain who also showed his mettle with seven match win bonuses and eight big games.
Third place in the stepladder went to George Stavrinou while the fourth spot went to marathon man Menno van den Heuvel, who surely deserved his place in the stepladder through sheer stamina and effort.
Van den Heuvel met Stavrinou in the first stepladder final match, and the Dutchman's 19-game ordeal may have come into play as he was beaten 235-201 by the Cypriot.
Stavrinou then faced Chamberlain in the semi-final, which could have gone either way right up to the final shot. The Englishman clinched it by a mere five pins (242-237).
The final was played on a best-of-three, and cool Swede Berndt bagged game one 235- 201 for the advantage.
Game two was closer and for several frames it looked as if a deciding third game was on the cards, but Berndt then pulled it back in his favour to win it 214-188, and so claim the Malta Open title along with the €2,500 cheque and tournament trophy.
"I knew it would be fun to bowl against Chamberlain in the final because he is a good player and he had bowled well all week," Berndt said.
"The crowd support for the Cyprus guy was incredible but the English were good supporters too."
Berndt is a student at the Wichita State University in the US, a famous school dedicated to bowling in its sports curriculum. They have won the collegiate championships for the past three years.