The Irish Golf Club Gazette: 08/04/14

8/04/2014

Ireland Defend Home International Trophy

Ireland will seek to defend the Boys Home Internationals trophy in the face of stiff competition at Western Gailes this week.

The Irish won in dramatic fashion at Forest Pines last year as Scotland failed to beat England in their final match with the result coming down to the last few singles matches.

England will be looking to win their third title in four years at the Ayrshire links from Tuesday 5 to Thursday 7 August while Scotland will be looking for their first win since 2006 at Moray and Wales will be hoping to achieve their first victory in the round robin series of matches.

Captain Roy Archibald’s line-up will feature only two members of the victorious 2013 team in Lincolnshire: Rowan Lester, who represented Ireland in the European Boys Team Championship in Oslo last month, and James Sugrue, who won the Munster Youths Amateur Open Championship in April. Kevin Leblanc will be expected to play a key role for the Irish after winning The R&A’s Junior Open Championship at West Lancs last month.

The English team will be led by Ashton Turner, who will make his third consecutive appearance in the Boys Home Internationals, Bradley Moore, who won the Irish Boys Amateur Open Championship in June, and Marco Penge, who finished tied fourth with Matty Lamb in the recent McGregor Trophy.

The 2013 Boys Amateur Champion Ewen Ferguson, who recently added the Scottish Boys Open Stroke Play title to his Scottish Boys Match Play crown, will lead a strong Scottish team that also includes Scottish Boys Stroke Play runner-up Ben Kinsley and Robert MacIntyre, who last year became the first player to win the Scottish boys and youths stroke play titles in the same year.

Newly crowned Welsh Boys Match Play Champion Ben Chamberlain will be in confident mood for the matches as will his team mate Thomas Williams, who will be looking to build on the form which saw him reach the semi-finals at Wenvoe Castle.

Johnnie Cole-Hamilton, Executive Director – Championships at The R&A, said, “The Boys Home Internationals matches give the talented young players the opportunity to gain valuable experience of representing their countries and playing against their peers from the other Home Nations. We would encourage spectators to come along to support the event at Western Gailes this week where the matches should be as closely contested as ever.”

The teams are as follows:

Ireland: Cathal Butler (Kinsale), Owen Crooks (Bushfoot), Jamie Fletcher (Warrenpoint), Peter Kerr (Royal Portrush), Kevin Leblanc (The Island), Eoin Leonard (Wentworth), Rowan Lester (Hermitage), Thomas Mulligan (Laytown & Bettystown), Tommy O’Driscoll (Ring of Kerry), Conor Purcell (Portmarnock) and James Sugrue (Mallow).

England: Jamie Dick (Forest Hills), Harry Hall (West Cornwall), Matty Lamb (Hexham), Jamie Li (Bath), Haydn McCullen (Delamere Forest), Bradley Moore (Kedleston Park), Marco Penge (Golf at Goodwood), Jack Singh Brar (Remedy Oak), Jake Storey (Alnmouth), Jonathan Thomson (Lindrick) and Ashton Turner (Kenwick Park).

Scotland: Joseph Bryce (Bathgate), George Burns (Williamwood), Stuart Easton (Irvine), Ewen Ferguson (Bearsden), Adam Fisher (Newmachar), Calum Fyfe (Cawder), Ben Kinsley (St Andrews), Ryan Lumsden (Royal Wimbledon), Robert MacIntyre (Glencruitten), Niall McMullen (Lundin) and Murray Naysmith (Marriott Dalmahoy).

Wales: Jack Davidson (Llanwern), Joshua Davies (Celtic Manor), Tim Harry (Vale Resort), Kyle Harman (Radyr), David Ramsay (Mold), Thomas Williams (Wrexham), Ben Chamberlain (Padeswood & Buckley), Lewys Sanges (Celtic Manor), Gaelen Trew (Wentworth), Rhys Jones (Mountain Ash) and Thomas Froom (Nefyn).

The Boys Home Internationals has been a proving ground for dozens of Walker Cup players and future Major Championship winners including Open Champion Rory McIlroy, the 2013 US Open Champion Justin Rose, six-time Major winner Sir Nick Faldo, former Open and Masters Champion Sandy Lyle and former Open Champion Darren Clarke.

Spectators are admitted free of charge to the event, which runs from Tuesday to Thursday, 5-7 August. The playing format is a full round robin series of matches comprising five morning foursomes and ten afternoon singles matches. The morning foursomes tee off from 8am and the afternoon singles matches from 12.30pm each day.

Match one on Tuesday 5 August will be Ireland versus Wales and match two will be England versus Scotland.

McIlroy Looking After Number One

Getty Images

Rory McIlroy repeated the winning trick in Akron, Ogion, on Sunday, to capture the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational and return to world No 1 - holidng off Sergio Garcia for the second time in as many weeks.

McIlroy turned a three-shot deficit into a two-shot lead within the space of five holes at Firestone Country Club, before Garcia battled back to leave the pair tied heading into the back nine.

Garcia had played the same back nine in just 27 shots in his second round of 61, but it was McIlroy who came out on top two days later in a tense duel, the 25-year-old carding a closing 66 to finish 15 under par and claim his first World Golf Championship victory.

With Adam Scott finishing outside the top five, that meant McIlroy reclaimed the world No 1 spot he last held in March 2013, just in time for the final major of the year, next week's US PGA Championship at Valhalla.

After 16 birdies in the first three rounds Garcia could only manage one in a disappointing closing 71 to finish 13 under, meaning the 34-year-old has now won just three times after holding the 54-hole lead on 16 occasions.

"What I am really proud of this week is following on from the Open with a performance like this," McIlroy, only the second European winner of the title after Darren Clarke in 2003, told CBS. "I said straight after I did not want any let down, I wanted to keep going and performing until the end of the season.

"It's great to come to one of my favourite tournaments of the year and to perform like this I am pretty satisfied."

McIlroy pulled his opening drive into the rough but had a gap through the trees and hit a superb low pitch to three feet, while Garcia had to settle for a par by two-putting from long range.

Three-time major winner McIlroy then two-putted from long range on the par-five second for another birdie and also birdied the third to take over the lead as Garcia bogeyed, but that did not tell half the story of an amazing hole.

Garcia's errant drive into the crowd somehow knocked the diamond out of a female spectator's engagement ring and after giving her a signed ball, the Spaniard asked for her contact information after hitting his second shot over the green.

Thankfully, the precious stone was quickly recovered but Garcia was unable to get up and down to save par and McIlroy holed from eight feet for a third straight birdie.

When McIlroy also birdied the fifth from five feet it meant a five-shot swing had taken place in the space of five holes and gave the world number two a two-shot lead.

Garcia desperately needed something to go in his favour and it happened on the eighth, McIlroy driving into the rough and finding a greenside bunker with his approach, from where he failed to get up and down.

Garcia then got back on level terms with a birdie from 15 feet on the ninth, McIlroy missing from just six feet.

That meant the pair went into the back nine tied on 14 under par but it was McIlroy who edged back in front with a birdie on the 11th from eight feet, Garcia then missing from a few inches closer.

The decisive moment then came on the par-three 15th, where Garcia's tee-shot left of the green left him with a near-impossible pitch over a bunker and led to a bogey four.

That gave McIlroy a two-shot lead with three to play and when Garcia failed to convert a birdie chance from 10 feet on the 17th his chance had gone.

The big story earlier in the day had come when Tiger Woods was forced to withdraw with a back problem.

Woods hit a number of poor shots in the fourth round and, after missing the fairway with his tee shot on the ninth hole he grimaced and reached towards his back before being driven off the course in a cart.

The 38-year-old had back surgery on March 31 which ruled him out of action for three months and the latest problem must put his participation in next week’s US PGA Championship in doubt.

Low scoring had been the order of the day on the rain-softened course, five-time major winner Phil Mickelson charging through the field with an eight-under-par 62 which featured 10 birdies and two bogeys.

"I don't know what to say, it kind of came out of nowhere," Mickelson said after finishing five under for the tournament. "The first two rounds really threw me for a loop. I have been struggling getting my short irons close and today they were right on.

"I made a lot of birdies and it was nice. Today was a big day to give me a lot of confidence and momentum heading into the US PGA next week."

England's Lee Westwood had also found some welcome form after four consecutive missed cuts, the 41-year-old carding a flawless 63 that did not go unnoticed by watching Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley.

"If you look at the one pillar that has been consistent throughout the Ryder Cup success we have had since the 90s it has been Lee Westwood but you want to see Lee in form," said McGinley on Sky Sports 4, well aware that Westwood is outside the automatic qualifying places.

"He is not going to get in on his reputation alone. He needs some form, he knows that and it's good to see him playing well today."