Merewether’s Morgan Cibilic has finished fifth in the World Surf League’s seven-stop Championship Tour, earning a spot in the inaugural Final Five showdown.
By now, the surprise around Cibilic’s emergence at the pointy end of the world rankings has surely faded away. After launching himself into the top 100 over the course of the 2019 Qualifying Series (QS), the board rider who grew up between Merewether and Angourie has put in another stellar season.
The competition on both the men’s and women’s tours across seven different events was as tight as it gets in world sport. To give some perspective, recent Olympic bronze medallist Owen Wright ranked 25th and will have to qualify for next year through QS events.
Ahead of Cibilic in fourth place is America’s Conner Coffin, who pinched this spot from Cibilic after his fifth place finish at the most recent event in Barra de la Cruz, Mexico.
Despite this, Cibilic’s consistency in high end results from December last year to August has ensured his entrance into the final contest.
Starting off with a 17th place finish at the Banzai Pipeline in Hawaii, he then placed third on home waters at the Newcastle Cup in April, followed by fifth place in Narrabeen, 17th again at the Margaret River, second at Rottnest Island, then two ninths at the Lemoore Surf Ranch, California, and at Barra de la Cruz.
In the top three spots sits the Brazilian trio who have each been clinical in their appearances this season.
Of the top five, they are the only three to have won events this tour.
In first place, two-time World Champion Gabriel Medina will enter the final clash as the favourite after an outstanding season involving two Australian wins in Narrabeen and Rottnest Island, three seconds in Hawaii, Newcastle and California, a fifth place in Mexico and ninth at the Margaret River.
In fact, if it was not for this year’s inclusion of the Final Five showdown, Medina would have won the CT based upon accumulated points after winning event number five at Rottnest.
Cibilic, not unlike the others, will likely see the long-time CT competing goofyfooter as his biggest obstacle, after three knock-out defeats by him in the first three events, including a heartbreaking loss in the semifinal of the Newcastle Cup.
Yet in the cup’s final, it was the Tokyo 2020 gold medallist and defending world champion Italo Ferreira who came out on top and continued to finish second on the tour after two further thirds, a fifth and ninth place.
In third place is Filipe Toledo, fresh from two wins in the latter half of the season but eager to do better than his most recent 17th place finish.
From September 9 to 17, the final 10 surfers – five male, five female – will congregate at Lower Trestles in California to sort out the end leader board.
The WSL has chosen a time frame where they expect to get most out of the world-renowned cobblestone point, considered one of the most high-performance waves in the world.
As a natural-footed, compact power surfer capable of high-profile carves and forehand rail turns, Cibilic will seek to bring the right-hand point surf experience of his origins at Angourie and Merewether into play on the Trestles signature long, right-handed walls.
These waves will allow all competitors the opportunity to bring their best form with a focus on manoeuvrability along the critical sections of its steep face. There will be ample opportunity for aerial spins and grabs.
Victory will certainly be difficult for Cibilic, who will need to beat all other competitors if he is to win. The event is a sudden-death, knock-out, winner-goes-on comp. Fifth place will compete against fourth, and the winner then moves on to compete against third, continuing until one challenger remains to face Medina at long last.
In the Women’s, Tokyo gold medallist Carissa Moore, like Medina, will wait until the final session before she hits the waves.
Australia’s Sally Fitzgibbons and Stephanie Gilmore are also in competition for the Championship after finishing in third and fourth, both having already tasted CT victory in the latter half of the season.
Haakon Barry