Murray’s Cosily Putts JONES, RICHARDS AMATEUR FINAL

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31161, 10 September 1966, Page 17

Murray’s Cosily Putts JONES, RICHARDS AMATEUR FINAL

(By

R. T. BRITTENDEN)

I*or the third time in the last four years, the Russley Golf Club has a representative in the final of the New Zealand amateur championship.

E. 11. M. Richards, of Hororata, playing in the championship only for the third time, will today meet S. G. Jones, of I lastings, who has won the title five times.

They won their way to the final against stiff opposition and some of the most bleak and blustery weather in the long history of the event.

Richards played exceptionally well to defeat P. A. Maude, of Waikato, in his semifinal.

The match in which Jones beat R. C. Murray at the twentieth will win a place among the great golfing classics.

Richards, aged 39, a farmer, has tremendous strength and length, should he require it. With it, he has a wonderfully sure touch when chipping and putting.

Jones, who is 41, has vast experience of major tournaments. much tenacity, and the ability to make few mistakes. It should be a great match.

50 m.p.h. Winds

The quarter-finals in the morning were played in pleasant spring weather, but just after the semi-finals had started. the temperature dropped suddenly by almost 20 degrees, and a bitterly cold wind, with gusts of 50 miles an hour, brought with it sharp rain showers and hail. The last of the youngsters, P. R. Adams (Invercargill), was eliminated in the quarterfinals by Maude, but it was a sustained and thrilling battle. Adams had a lead of two holes after four, but they both fell into error and Adams came out worse: they were square at the turn. The homeward half produced some exciting moments. They halved the tenth in birdies, and played to par until Adams won the fourteenth with a birdie. But lie missed the fifteenth green, and they went on halving holes in par figures until the twentieth, where Maude made a remarkable recovery from the fourth fairway. Then he pitched over a bunker to within 30 inches of the hole. Adams chipped too strongly, and his 10-feet putt slipped by the side of the hole, ending a brave effort from a very talented young player.

Richards Longer

The defeat of the titleholder, J. D. Durry, by Richards. was a surprise, but Richards's victory was ■well earned. As expected, he was longer off the tees than Durry, but he made more errors.

Richards began by confidently stroking in a 20-footer for a birdie at the first but he was soon a hole behind, Durry winning the fourth with a birdie, and Richards squaring the match with a birdie at the ninth, where Durry failed to hole a reasonable putt Durry’s putting suggested uncertainty almost throughout the round, and his judgment of length with his iron shots was also at fault Much of his golf, however, was of immaculate quality and it was simply his inability to get the ball up to the pin which cost him the match. Richards, the only player during the morning to reach the plateau at the eleventh, had a birdie there, and he became two up when Durry missed a four-footer at the fourteenth.

Durry. bunkered at the fifteenth, saved it with a sixfoot putt and he was back in the game when Richards hit his drive out of bounds at the sixteenth. Richards made a

bold effort to save this hole. A tremendous 2 j-wood from the fairway looked certain to

be pin high on the green r or 4. but the ball struck a woman spectator and stopped just short of the green.

Fatally Short

Durry was fatally short with his iron at the last hole, when he had to have a win to keep the match alive. Then Durry chipped sft short but Richards, in whose family chipping is a particular accomplishment—he had to

yield first place to his mother in a chipping competition at the Hororata club—put his 10 inches from the hole. The tall Hastings player. 11 R. Carver, started with two birdies and wins against Murray, but after that he began missing putts and Murray was able, after the turn, to exert fierce pressure on him.

B. M. Silk (Wanganui) also lacked his usual touch on and around the greens, and he needed it to compete with Jones, who was two under the card, when the game ended. For the fifth round in succession, Jones had a birdie two at the tenth. Two of the strongest players in the field, Maude and Hichards, made interesting ooponents. From the tees. Maude attacked much more vigorously than Richards, and he made fewer errors. But with his irons, Maude was

I not nearly as accurate as the Russley man. who also held a I distinct advantage in the 'short game.

Richards three-putted the eighth, a hole at which he was in trouble all the way, but otherwise put his approach putts dead or holed them. Only once did Richards fail to chip within a foot of the cup, and this unrelenting accuracy finally wore Maude down.

I The wind began to get up soon after they started, and [when they had played three (holes Richards was one under par and two up. The fifth j hole, a terribly testing one of 425 yards on most days, was demolished, for length by Maude who. with the wind at (his back, hit a drive of fully (330 yards.

He played a sand blaster ifor his second, where during I the week the 3-iron has been (used quite consistently. But (he could do no better than (a four and a half.

Lucky Bounce

I At the turn, Richards was (one over and one up. He hit la tremendous 2-iron, downwind, at the eleventh to be well down the plateau and his par four put him two up. He also won the twelfth, when (Maude hooked his drive but Maude, after hitting trees with his drive at the long thirteenth, had a lucky bounce and took advantage of it. His birdie won the hole (although Richards made a i fine effort from 15 feet.

I Very deliberate on the ; greens, Maude holed a good 12-foot putt at the fourteenth (for his four. Richards, taking one-fifth the time, had (his half from 10 feet. Richards went three up at the (short fifteenth, where his chip put him two inches from the hole, from 30 feet out. And this time he made no mistake at the sixteenth. i The gallery which survived (the worst of the weather to watch the Murray-Jones match through to its end was \ amply rewarded. It was a magnificent match and one which, on reflection, Murray I should almost certainly have i won.

He had three or four chances of obtaining a really telling grip on the game, but his putting let him down. Murray has never been a spectacularly good putter, but by most standards, he is a sound one. Yesterday, he missed putts of two or three feet at the fifteenth and seventeenth, as well as threeputting the eighth.

Frozen Fingers

But in such conditions, even the smallest putt was a prob lem. When, for instance. Mur ray stood on the seventeenth green, the high wind was driving the rain almost horizontally and it was dreadfully cold. Murray certainly does not lack courage, and that his frozen fingers failed him at these crises was certainly no slight on his game. That Jones made so few errors in such appalling weather was astonishing. They offered a startling contrast—Murray solidly built, much more robust than the lean, slight Jones. From tee to green Murray played better golf than his opponent. He hit his woods with more certainty, and his irons were also struck with more assurance and accuracy.

Not that there was much in it; and the level of achievement of both players was often incredible. Jones showed wonderful tenacity, and the ad mirable fighting spirit for which he is noted.

Before the tournament began there was a feeling among golfers that Jones might be dropped from the New Zealand team for the Eisenhower Trophy because of his indifferent performances on most of his previous overseas tours.

Selection Safe

With skill and determination. Jones has made his omission an impossibility. He qualified second—and the stroke rounds ! were of vital importance in the selection—and now he is in the final again. Not the greatest golfers on ! the television screens could ! have performed any better than I Jones and Murray at the start of their remarkable match. In the | first nine holes, they had eight birdies—and this in a ihowling wind and arctic temperature. If ever there was a sound argu ment for the retention of match play among major golf events, this was it.

Jones struck the first blow—a birdie three, from six feet, at the first. Downwind, the long second gave them comfortable birdies; at the third, the wind swept both tee shots down the bank: Murray holed out for two.

Playing the fourth into the fierce wind. Jones punched a superb 4-iron to the green and won with four. The fifth was the sharp contrast. With the wind, Jones needed only a fluent 7-iron to hole a three-foot birdie putt Murray, two down. struck back strongly. He had a birdie at the sixth, with a short putt, and then hit a grand 4-wood into the seventh green (197 yards) and holed his eight-foot putt. The eighth provided the only flaws in the half—two five s, with Murray three-putting. But he went ahead with another birdie at the ninth, born of a great pitch shot which left him a foot from the hole. Murray was 34. three under. Jones 35 the best ball was 31. This time Jones did not have a birdie at the tenth. Murray saving the hole with a fine putt after he had been bunkered. Thick yellow clouds of pollen blew across the course, the

temperature kept dropping, and the inevitable errors began. A hook cost Murray the eleventh, a hook by Jones gave him the twelfth, and again he was one up. Murray lost a great chance at the thirteenth. He was just in front of the green for two, and had a straightforward chip, with Jones well away for three. But Murray chipped short and the hole was halved in five s. At the fourteenth, Murray came shakily from a bunker, but his putt from 25 feet dropped lazily into the hole. From nine feet out Jones also had his four with a weary-looking putt. The fifteenth was a tragedy for Murray. A perfectlv-struck iron rifled towards the flag, but this green is one of the most exposed and the gale flung his ball down the bank. Jones aimed 20 yards to the left of the green but met the same fate.

But Murray three-putted, and then let Jones out of the bag again at the seventeenth. Murray hit two wonderfully good shots, but Jones’s drive hit the trees, and so did his second. But again Murray three-putted.

Two of the finest shots of the match were played at the eighteenth. Murray was through to the practice putting green for two, Jones short and on an awful lie, flat mud. Murray pitched 50 yards out, magnificently—a foot from the hole: Jones, with the yawning bunker before him, chipped over and left himself a three-footer. It was the shot of a champion, and he deserved his half.

They both putted a little tentatively for fours at the nineteenth, and Murray was a shade unlucky to lose, at last. His iron at the long twentieth was truly struck and made the green, for a moment. But it struck the sharp V point where the bunker ends, and kicked sharply left into the trap. He did not come out well enough to match Jones’s birdie four.

As a frozen but elated spectator remarked, the pity of it all was that someone had to lose. CHAMPIONSHIP Quarter-finals P. A. Maude (Waitomo) beat P. R Adams (Invercargill), at the twentieth.

E. H. M. Richards (Russley) beat J; D. Durry (Paparaumu Beach), 2 up. R. C. Murray (Otago) beat H. R. Carver (Hastings). 5 and 4. S. G Jones (Hastings) beat B. M. Silk (Wanganui), 5 and 4. Semi-finals Richards beat Maude, 3 and 2. Jones beat Murray at the twentieth. PLATE First Round G. E. Clarke (St. Clair) beat M. W. Stanley (Kaiapoi), at the twenty-fifth; B. A. Stevens (Hamilton) beat J. F. Logie (Russley), 2 up; R. K. Atkinson (Russley) zeat I. D. Woodbury (Hutt). 4 and 3; R. E. Clements (Templeton) beat L. Elder (Templeton), 5 and 4. A. J Palmer (North Otago) beat M. R. Blank (Christchurch), 3 and 1: G. C. Stevenson (Waikato) beat P. K. Cleland (Russley), 3 and 2; F. Bradley (Russley) beat A. C. Browne (Ashburton). 2 and 1; C. W. Caldwell (Christchurch) beat D. J. Gaudin (Avondale), at the twentieth. Quarter-finals Stevens beat Clarke at the nineteenth; Clements beat Atkinson. 1 up; Stevenson beat Palmer. 2 up; Caldwell beat Bradley, 4 and 2.