EIGHT athletes will represent the country in the Under 21 International Bowling Federation World Championship in Sweden next month.

Jordan Dinham, Danielle Evangelista, Marc Custodio, Stephen Diwa, Grace Gella, Norel Nuevo, Alyssa Ty and Dale Lazo comprise the team which is set to leave for Helsingborg City on June 18. The tournament will be held from June 20 to 29 at the 20-lane Olympia Bowling Center.

Except for Dinham who is based in Australia, the players have been training together with the SEAG team at the Coronado Lanes in Starmall, Mandaluyong City, since October last year.

“We are underdogs but still have a chance to win,” coach Biboy Rivera, the men’s singles gold medalist in the 2010 Asian Games, said.

Rivera, who won the 2006 World Tenpin Bowling Championships, served as coach of the men’s team that pocketed two golds from the men’s singles (Merwin Tan) and the team-offour (Tan, Christian Dychangco, Patrick Nuqui and Ivan Malig) in the recent Vietnam SEAG.

The Sweden tournament will be the first for the youth players since 2019 when Nuevo and Gella won the bronze medals at the World Junior Bowling Championships in Saint-Maximin, France. Nuevo, Gella and Ty also joined the Asian Youth Tenpin Bowling Championships in Sarawak, Malaysia, in the same year.

“The girls are hungry for tournaments and hungry of winning, too,” said Josephine Canare, a SEAG gold medalist and an Asian Games silver medal winner before she became women’s/girls team coach. She added that this is the last year that Gella and Ty are playing in the youth team.

The World Youth Championships was postponed last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic.