ENGLAND SEEK ANOTHER SHERRY CUP SUCCESS
Although Gary Wolstenholme (Kilworth Springs GC) will miss
the chance to defend the title, England is sending a strong
four-man team to the Sherry Cup being played in Sotogrande,
Spain, on 24th to 27th March.
The four-man team, all members of the World Class Performance
Programme Elite Squad, will comprise Lee Corfield (Burnham
& Berrow GC), Ross Fisher (Wentworth GC), Michael Skelton
(Middlesbrough GC) and Richard Walker (Frodsham GC).
Wolstenholme, the Amateur champion and Walker Cup star who
has won the individual title in the Sherry Cup three times
in the past four years, is competing in the NCAA Hall of Fame
tournament in Houston, Texas, which finishes on the 21st,
three days prior to the Spanish event. Nevertheless, the England
quartet, who have all taken part in pre-season training trips
to South Africa and Puerto Rico this year, have the ability
to maintain England's sparkling recent record in the tournament.
Corfield, 21, from Somerset, a member of the Elite Squad
for the past two years, enjoyed a successful 2003 in which
he finished runner-up in both the St Andrews Links Trophy
and the St Mellion Trophy. Last week he reached the last 16
of the Spanish Amateur at Desert Springs.
Fisher, 23, who made his full international debut when England
reached the final of last summer's European Men's Team Championships
in Holland, was back in the Cape recently for the South African
Stroke Play Championship, finishing joint 14th, which qualified
him for the South African Amateur. But he was eliminated in
the first match play round.
Skelton, the 19-year-old Walker Cup player, won the Welsh
Open Stroke Play Championship last year and finished runner-up
in the English Amateur at Alwoodley. That prompted his Walker
Cup call-up and a full England debut in the Home Internationals
in Ireland. The young Yorkshireman also competed in the recent
South African events, finishing equal 18th in the Stroke Play
and losing in the second round of the Amateur.
Walker, 32, a former winner of the Brabazon Trophy and the
German and Portuguese Amateur titles will Captain the England
team for the event. He has played in the last two Sherry Cups,
finishing fourth behind Wolstenholme last year while being
a member of the England team which won the European Nations
Championship.
The Sherry Cup is competed for over 72 holes with the best
three cards each day counting towards the European Nations
Championship team event. The individual competition will run
simultaneously with the Nations Championship, the champion
collecting a Gold Sherry Wine Trophy and the Amateur Masters
Jacket. If the Championship ends in a tie, the teams involved
will nominate one player to compete in a sudden death play-off.
Previous winners of this prestigious event include the likes
of Padraig Harrington (1991), and Sergio Garcia (1997 and
1998).
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