FEAT UNPARALLELED IN BRITISH GOLF

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 39, 9 November 1938, Page 7

FEAT UNPARALLELED IN BRITISH GOLF

Four Rounds In The Sixties PERRY’S PERFORMANCE IN £750 TOURNAMENT Alfred Berry, the British open golf champion of 1935, accomplished a feat unparalleled in British golf recently by winning the Dunlop-Metropolitan £750 tournament in Wentworth. Surrey, witli four rounds each under 70 (69, 68, 67 and 69) for an aggregate of 273. Never before has a first-class British tournament, on a full-length course so ■.testing as the West course in Wentworth been won with four rounds in file sixties, though W. Lawson Little won the Canadian Open Championship two years ago with four rounds in the sixties in Toronto.

Ferry’s score, which was no fewer than 35 strokes below the standard scratch score, was six strokes better than tliat of his nearest rival. Henry Cotton, another former champion who had the amazing record round of 64. It is almost impossible to exaggerate the merits of the crazy golf played in this tournament, says F. J. C. Bignon in the London “Daily Mall.”

It was open only to the leading championship and tournament winners of the year, and good scoring was expected. But nothing quite like this play has ever before been witnessed. Sheer pluck won the tournament for Perry. He is one of those men who goes out for everything whatever shot he may have to play. If the hole Is within reach lie goes for it, and never plays for safety. There were times when his pluck landed him in

diflieulties, for though good, his golf was not immaculate. Grand Putting.

■When necessary, however, Perry not only made brilliant recoveries, but frequently gained birdie figures hy grand putting. That was a feature of his game on the final day. In his round of 67 in the morning his putting was splendid, but it. was even better in his last round of 69.

Perry, who led the field from the beginning of the event, was four shots ahead of Cotton with one round to play, and with 35 out could be overtaken. But during the last nine holes Perry, with an old rusty-headed putter, banged the ball courageously into the hole with such effect that he bad a total of only 12 putts on the homeward nine greens, five of the putts being between four and 10 yards.

Perry was heading for a final round of 66 when, at the seventeenth, he went out of bounds rather unluckily with a spoon shot, and this hole cost him six. Cotton, however, could do no better than 71 in the final round, and that was no good to him. Cotton spoke truly when at the completion of the wonder round of 64 he said he played the best golf of his life.

He was incredibly accurate and, strange though it may seem, Cotton almost had a score iu the fifties, for he rimmed the hole with several putts that stopped out. There were only three shots in the round that were not as near to perfection as humanly possible, and these were indifferent only by comparison with the rest of his immaculate play.

His putting, which has this season frequently failed him, was so good that he had only 29 putts in the round, but it was the accuracy of his long game that made putting easy for him. Such feats as those of the leaders overshadowed all the other brilliant scores, and though there were several scores in the sixties, they counted for very little as it happened.