6th July, Kuching, Sarawak: Australia finally captured their first gold medal of the 2026 IBF World Youth Bowling Championships with an emphatic victory over challenger, Finland, 2-0 while USA picked up their second gold medal after defeating Singapore in the Girl's Team final.

Jackson Buckingham, Nicholas Rajkovic, Singles silver medalist, Julian Dinham and Blake Walsh narrowly edged Czechia's Vit Jiriste, David Mojka, Roni Leskinen and Juho Vuoppola, 240-237 in their first game. With the confidence gained from the opener, the Aussie quartet romped home a second win, 249-192 to captured their first gold medal.

Australia had ousted USA, 2-0 (246-234 and 197-187) in the second semi-final match contested on Thursday, July 2 to book their spot in today's finale. Czechia had beaten top-seed, Qatar, 2-0 (246-228 and 228-202) in the first semi-final match to set up the clash with Australia.

Qatar and USA finished first and second in Group A of the Matchplay round and Australia and Czechia finished first and second in Group A to advance to the semi-finals.

Meanwhile USA's Erin Klemencic, Gianna Brandolino, Elizabeth Teuber and Katelyn Abigania swept past Singapore's Lim Shi En, Ashley Victoria Lok, Nur Irdina Binte Hazly and Hazel Tan Wei Ning, 201-181 in the first game. The second game was a tight one but USA prevailed to take the second game, 199-189 for their third gold medal of the championship.

The champion had beaten Australia, 2-0 in yesterday's semi-finals match to earn their spot in the final. Singapore narrowly defeated Malaysia, 2-1 (202-176, 194-216 and 210-199) in the first semi-final match to face the American quartet in the final.

USA (187) survived a one-game three-way tie-breaker at the end of the Matchplay round beating Finland (177) and Czechia (171) when they totaled 15 points each. Malaysia topped Group A with USA in second. Australia finished first in Group B with 15 points.

Singapore (226) advanced to the semi-finals after narrowly defeating Japan (220), Korea (220) and Germany (160) in the one-game four-way tie-breaker when they ended the Matchplay round with 12 points each.

Photos by Terence Yaw in Kuching, Sarawak.

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