Northern Ireland suffered last frame agony as England took the WEPF World Team title at the Grand Hotel in Blackpool.

The NI boys came into the tournament as World champions and strong favourites and justified that tag as they dominated the group stages, winning all 14 of their matches, including an 13-8 victory over England.

Led by new World singles champion Ronan McCarthy, their star-studded line-up won a close semi-final with Malta 11-8 to set up a much-awaited clash with England who despatched a Tom Cousins-led Wales by 11 frames to five.

In a hugely close final NI led 10-9 in the best of 21 frames affair but England wrestled the world crown from them with Lee Kendall and Giuseppe D’Imperior winning the decisive frames again Rab McCullough and Ronan Fay for a dramatic 11-10 victory.

placeholder image — Paul McIlwaine with members of the NI Ladies team at the WEPF World Championships in Blackpool

The standard of pool was breath-taking throughout the week and NI’s Ronan Fay was in devastating form, topping the individual rankings, winning an incredible 35 out of 39 frames – a remarkable 89.74 average.

Meanwhile the NIPPO ladies team reached the semi-final stage before being narrowly defeated by France by 8 frames to 7.

Emma Cunningham reached the semi-finals of the Ladies World Masters and also the quarter-finals of the Ladies Singles.

The NI under-18 team came home World runners-up, losing out to a commanding performance by Malta in the final.

Gerard Heaney, Jack Hull, Devin Rankin and Rhys McLaughlin, earned an automatic semi-final place on frames difference from the group matches and knocked out England, led by new junior World champion Jaden Billingham 8-6 to reach the final.

Rhys finished runner up in player of the tournament, losing out by a single frame to Steven Muscat from Malta.

Gerard and Rhys also reached the semi-final stage of the World Junior Scotch Doubles championship.

Newry’s Marcel Kusa reached the quarter-finals of the Singles, where he lost to Billingham, who went on to win the World crown against Ireland’s Cillian Smyth.