ENGLAND SEEK TO END EUROPEAN LEAN SPELL AT NAIRN
England will seek to end a run of 11 years without a victory
in the event by sending 8 Elite Squad members to contest the
European International Amateur Championship at Nairn Golf
Club, Scotland on 20-23 August.
The party includes new England champion Gary Lockerbie, Graeme
Clark, Lee Corfield, Ross Fisher, Farren Keenan, Matthew Richardson,
Daniel Wardrop and Gary Wolstenholme.
Other English players entered in the event are Paul Bradshaw,
Adam Gee, James Heath, Stephen Lewton, Jamie Moul, Sam Osborne,
Martin Sell, David Skinns and Eddie Vernon.
Lockerbie, 20, will make his full England debut in the Home
Internationals at Ballybunion next month after winning the
English title with a 6 and 5 victory over fellow Elite Squad
member Michael Skelton at Alwoodley earlier this month.
Fisher, 22, is in a rich vein of form, having just won the
Finnish Amateur Championship by beating Wolstenholme at the
first hole of sudden death last Sunday in Helsinki when England
also won the Nations Cup.
Wolstenholme, who will celebrate his 43rd birthday on the
second day of the Championships, has yet to add the European
title to his vast collection of triumphs, although he was
joint runner-up behind Irishman, Paddy Gribben, in France
in 1998.
Gee, 22, has had a successful run that has included second
places in the South East Qualifier at Ealing and in the Midland
Open Amateur at Woodhall Spa and a third place in the Tillman
Trophy at Moortown.
Moul is also enjoying a successful season having finished
third in the Irish Open Amateur at Royal Dublin, fourth in
the Welsh Open Amateur at Prestatyn and fifth in the Hampshire
Hog. The 18 year old came close to winning the Suffolk Amateur
Championship, being beaten in a play-off, but he shot 62 at
Ealing to top the South East Qualifying.
Sell, runner-up in last year’s Amateur Championship
in Wales, reached the third round of this year’s event
having enjoyed a successful spring, sharing the Hampshire
Hog with Vernon, winning the Hampshire Salver and finishing
runner-up in the Selborne Salver.
Apart from his joint victory with Sell in the Hampshire Hog,
Vernon reached the second round of the Spanish Amateur and
recently won the Derbyshire Championship.
The last English player to win the European title was Jim
Payne who triumphed at Hillside in 1991. Heath, 20, came close
a year ago at Troia in Portugal, finishing runner-up to Raphael
Pellicioli from France.
The full party for Nairn is:
Graeme Clark (Doncaster), Lee Corfield (Burnham & Berrow),
Ross Fisher (Wentworth), Farren Keenan (Royal Mid-Surrey),
Gary Lockerbie (Penrith), Matthew Richardson (Pinner Hill),
Daniel Wardrop (Didsbury) and Gary Wolstenholme (Kilworth
Springs)
Paul Bradshaw (Gainsborough), Adam Gee (Leatherhead), James
Heath (Coombe Wood), Stephen Lewton (Woburn), Jamie Moul (Stoke-by-Nayland),
Sam Osborne (Wentworth), Martin Sell (Wrag Barn), David Skinns
(Lincoln) and Eddie Vernon (Burton)
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