Norway leads in team event at halftime in 2007 Men's European Championships

Mads Sandbaekken, Per Kristian Eide, Svein Roger Olsen, Lasse Ingebrigtsen and Petter Hansen took the lead in the 2007 Men's European Championships Team event after three games on short oil (35 ft.) with 3349 pinfall total and an average of 223.27.
L-R Team manager Erik Garder, Eide, Sandbaekken, Hansen, Olsen, Ingebrigtsen and coach Mats Karlsson. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Ingebrigtsen led the team with 748 (257, 247, 244) and an average of 249.33. World Youth Masters champion Sandbaekken (pictured right) closed out his 677 set with the third 300 game of the championships. Hansen had 645, Olsen 644 and Eide added 635.

Trailing Norway by 83 pins to sit in second place was Sweden. with Magnus Andersson, Robert Andersson, Dennis Eklund, Tobias Karlsson and Martin Larsen. The 1999 and 2003 World champion registered a 3266 pinfall total pins and an average of 217.73.

Defending European Team champion Finland and host country Austria moved into the top four in the second squad on Saturday afternoon.

Trios champions Joonas Jehkinen, Kimmo Lehtonen and Jari Ratia teamed with Petteri Salonen and Osku Palermaa and rolled games of 1148, 1035 and 1079 to sit in third place with 3262 pinfall total and an average of 217.47.
L-R Alho, Ratia, Salonen, Jehkinen, Palermaa, Lehtonen with coach Sami Konstri in the back.

Reigning World Cup champion Palermaa (pictured right), who led the team with 741 3-game pinfall, overtook the lead in All Events with 4783 21-game total and an overall average of 227.76. Previous leader Bo Winther Pedersen, Denmark, slipped one spot to second place with 4737 (225.57). Darren Cundy, England, is third with 4679 (222.81).

Doubles champions Thomas Gross/Thomas Tybl and Manfred Panzenböck, Michael Loos and Niki Schröder, Austria, started the day with 1043 and overtook the lead in the second squad with the high game of the day, 1189, but fell one spot in game three (1025) to land in fourth place on the short oil pattern with 3257 pinfall total and an average of 217.13.
L-R Front row: Gross, Tybl, Panzenböck. Back row: Grundschober, Loos, Schröder and coach Helmut Amstätter. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Mere 14 pins behind Austria was Greece with, Dimitrios Karetsos, Leonidas Maragkos, Nikolaos Boufesis, Stavros Parasakis and Evangelos Krizinis, with 3243 pinfall total and an average of 216.30.

Denmark with Jesper Agerbo, Bo Winther Pedersen, Thomas Larsen, Frederik Ohrgaard and Jimmy Mortensen are 156 pins off the pace for the top 4 in sixth place with 3101 and an average of 206.73.

The five-player teams were divided into two squads to bowl three games on short oil (35 ft.) on Saturday and three games on long oil (45 ft.) on Sunday.

The top 4 four teams after six games - three on short and three on long oil - will advance to the semi-finals starting at 6.00 p.m. on Sunday afternoon.

The No. 1 seed will bowl the No. 4 seed and the No. 2 will take on the No. 3. The winners advance to the title match and the losers will share the bronze medal. All matches will be one-game matches, the higher seed in any match will choose the lane condition (short or long oil) to play on.