CI campaign wraps up

Team Cook Islands’ Delhi Commonwealth Games campaign has wrapped up in India with bowlers Irene Tupuna and Pita Toto rolling up for the final time yesterday.

The two were the last Cook Islands athletes to compete at the games.

Although they battled hard and missed wins in tight tie breakers – they didn’t win enough games to qualify for the playoffs.

But Papa Pita Toto began his final day with a straight win 7-6, 9-5 against Brunei before going down 9-11, 6-12 to New Zealand.

He then had the battle of the tournament against a young bowler from England.

Papa Toto certainly had the young man agitated during the game after coming back from a first up 9-6 win by England to take the second set 9-6 and forcing a tie breaker.

Both players won an end each and the game went down to the wire in the last tie breaker end.

And after sending the kitty to the gutter Papa Toto felt he had the game in the bag but when the kitty was repositioned – the Englishman had the shot and took the win.

Despite the loss Papa Toto was buzzing with the excitement of the match which put him in fourth place in his division.

Unfortunately only the top three in each division advanced to the play off, unlike the pairs and triples division which saw the top four teams move to the next level of the competition.

Irene Tupuna on the other hand only won one of her three games on the final day of pool play.

Tupuna beat her Kenyan partner after a 4-1 tie breaker before going down to PNG and Samoa in her last two games.

Mama bowler certainly had some great bowls – but couldn’t clinch the wins.

Their final roll up marked the end of Team Cook Islands sporting adventures in India and now its time to chill out before returning home after representing the Cook Islands not only on the sports field but off the field as well.

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