WALKER CUP TRIO IN FIELD FOR ENGLISH AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP
Four members of the Great Britain and Ireland Walker Cup
team that will defend the trophy against the United States
in Chicago next month will be in action in the English Amateur
Championship at Bromborough Golf Club, Cheshire, from 25th
to 30th July.
All four, Robert Dinwiddie, Oliver Fisher, Matthew Richardson
and Gary Wolstenholme, are seeded in a field of 256 along
with Walker Cup reserve Jamie Moul, but Gary Lockerbie, English
champion in 2003 and the other Englishman selected, has decided
to spend the week practising in preparation for the trans-Atlantic
encounter.
Richardson, 20, will be the first in action. He is in the
fifth match out at 7.32am on Monday the 25th against local
hope, Jamie Howarth from Stockport.
Wolstenholme, despite his many successes, has never won the
English title. He reached the final in 2000 at Royal Lytham
but was beaten by Paul Casey, a member of last year’s
victorious Ryder Cup team, and was a semi-finalist in 2004
only to go down to eventual champion James Heath. This time
the Leicestershire-based 44 year old’s first hurdle
is against Royal Jersey’s Christy McLaughlin at 11.16am.
Dinwiddie, from Durham, has a 3pm start against Yorkshire’s
Nicholas McCarthy.
Fisher, the 16 year old from Essex, who will be the youngest
ever Walker Cup player when he tees off in Chicago, won’t
start his first round match until 9.24am on Tuesday when he
faces Norfolk’s Craig Waugh.
Moul, the 20-year-old international from Suffolk, will be
involved in a clash of the youngsters with Essex boy champion
Dale Whitnell at 3.32pm on Monday.
Among the other seeds in first day action is Kent’s
Steven Tiley, a member of England’s winning European
Team Championship side, who meets Yorkshire’s Andy Town,
a quarter finalist two years ago.
One of the most attractive Tuesday ties is the first round
meeting of England cap Adam Gee from Surrey and boy international
John Parry from Yorkshire.
David Horsey, beaten finalist at Notts Golf Club, Hollinwell,
last year, will start his bid for this year’s title
with a first round match against Essex Colts champion Ashley
Lucas. Horsey, 20, the current Cheshire champion, should feel
at home in his native county but he is involved in one of
the late first round ties and won’t tee off until 11.48am
on day two.
With defending champion Heath now a professional, and Lockerbie
absent, there are no former title holders in the field so
a new champion will be crowned after 36 holes on Saturday
the 30th.
Play starts at 7am on Monday with the first of 80 ties, all
over 18 holes.
|