KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia continued to measure up with the giants of lawn bowls on the second day of the inaugural ‘World Cup 2025.
Seasoned campaigner Emma Firyana Saroji brought the smiles for the home nation.
She has assured herself a silver medal in the women’s singles by qualifying for the finals.
And she did that in style, too, by upstaging World No.1 Dawn Hayman of Australia in a tense semi-final in a tie-breaker set.
Emma plays England’s Katherine Rednall in the final at the Indoor Juara Stadium in Bukit Kiara on Saturday.
Katherine ended hopes of an all-Malaysian final by defeating Nurul Alyani Jamil in the other semi-finals.
It will be Emma’s first major final in 10 years.
She last won the 2015 World Singles Champion of Champions gold in Brisbane.
“It was not easy, after having lost two matches in the group.
“The two defeats served as a wake up call. I just had to be more focused,” said Emma.
Bubbly Nurul had a gallant run, too. She was unbeaten in six matches en route to the semi-finals.
“It is not the end of the world. I gave my best and will bounce back in the pairs event,” said Nurul, who finished ahead of World No.3 Selina Goddard of New Zealand in the group.
Malaysia’s challenge in the men pairs and mixed pairs (para) fizzled out in the group stage.
2023 Worlds Bowls bronze medallists Muhd Soufi Rusli-Izzat Shameer Dzulkeple had a disappointing outing managing only two wins from 5 matches.
As expected, Scotland’s Paul Foster and World No.1 Jason Banks qualified for the final.
They play the Wales pair of Daniel Davies Jnr-Ross Owen.
Para athletes Muhd Rafi Muda and Jariah Zakaria were not outdone by their opponents.
12 top lawn bowls nations are competing in the inaugural ‘WC 2025’ in Bukit Kiara.
They are from Australia, Canada, England, Hong Kong China, India, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, South Africa, USA, Wales and host Malaysia.