16th July, Jakarta: Singapore national bowler, Remy Ong is still in the hunt to make the stepladder cut of the Men's Open Masters at the 8th Indonesia International Open despite finishing 11th in the first block on Friday.

Newly-crowned Macau China Open champion, Remy Ong did not have the best of starts managing only 181 in his opening game as Thailand's Annop Arramosaranon scorched to the lead with a superb 245, just 2 pins ahead of one of the defending champions, George Frilingos of Australia.

Although Ong picked up his pace a little with 199, the Singaporean posted another lowly 177 and was down mid-field. Local favourite, Ryan Lalisang took over the running to go 37 pins ahead of the Taiwanese.

A much improved 227, 204 and 222 put Ong back in the running as Chinese Taipei's Hsieh Jing Liang posted a scintilating 263 to become the new leader. Another Singaporean, Jason Yeong-Nathan did better with 203, 179, 217 and 232 in the first half and was slightly better than his team-mate.

The Taiwanese continued his relentless pace to close out the first block with 1829 and a convincing margin of 93 pins as Lalisang ended in second with 1736. Malaysia's SYafiq Ridhwan took third spot with 1690.

Ong completed the block with 1602 but finished 11th and 47 pins off sixth-placed Cheng Chao-Yu of Chinese Taipei in sixth position. 2007 Indonesia champion amd PBA pro, Jason Belmonte and Malaysia's Adrian Ang finished ahead of Cheng in fourth and fifth positions.

Jason Yeong-Nathan fizzled off with three poor games to drop down to 19th position while the third Singaporean, Ng Tiac Pin managed 17th position.

The men will resume with their second block of 8 games tomorrow afternoon after the women take to the lanes for their second 8 games. The top 6 would then advance to the stepladder finals.

Detailed scores: Men's Open Block 1 | Photo Album.

Photos by Terence Yaw in Jakarta.