The Canadian Short Mat Bowling Association (CSMBA) has announced the names of the players who will represent Canada at the World Short Mat Bowling Championships in Herentals, Belgium between March 18-20th 2020. Four Cobourg bowlers will form part of the twenty one member team.
Mike Place and John MacKenzie will play in the Fours and Bill Arthur in Singles. Louisa Arthur will be the team alternate.
Team selection was based on performance at the Canadian Championships held at the Cobourg Community Centre between November 19th and 23rd.
Place and MacKenzie were, it is fair to say, the surprise winners of the Pairs Championship and that gained them automatic qualification for the team.
In the Canadian championships players could enter all of the four disciplines (singles, pairs, triples and fours) but in the World Championships can only play in one discipline. Since there were some multiple winners in the Canadian Championships this created places on the team which required wild card selections. Based on overall performance Bill Arthur gained one of the wild card selections and Louisa Arthur, who was unfit to play until the last day of the Canadian Championships, was selected as the official team alternate based on her performance at the 2018 Championships where she was a member of the triples gold medal team.
The best overall performance in 2019 by a Cobourg member was Martin Foxhall who won two gold medals, and a silver. It is unfortunate that Foxhall is unavailable for the World Championships as he would have proved a great asset to the team.
This will be the first time that Place and MacKenzie have competed at the World Championships which are held every two years. This will be the second time the Arthurs have been to the World Championships having been part of a triples team in Stromstad, Sweden in 2018.
Fourteen countries will compete in the World Championships. The full list can be found at http://www.shortmatbowls.be/en/Deelnemers-WK2020/
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
