GOLF

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 17 June 1932, Page 2

GOLF

NEW ENGLISH CHAMPION (From Our Own Correspondent! LONDON, sth May. . Eric Fiddian is the new amateur champion of English golf. He gained this distinction at Sandwich, when in the thirty-six holes final lie defeated A. S. Bradshaw, who captained Oxford against Cambridge in 1929, on the last green by one up. It was a great match, and the golf excellent in the trying wind. All day there were ne-ver more than two holes between the players, jlncleecl, they went to tho last hole all square. Both men were iust off the green witli their second shots. Bradshaw was in some doubt as to what club to take, and, after having apparently made up lii.s mind, he changed it. The result was unfortunate. He miss-hit the hall, and left himself six yards from the flag. Here was Fiddian.’s chance, and he tool; it- with wonderful sureness. In fact, from his chip the ball finished by the side of the hole, and after Bradshaw had failed to get down his putt, Fiddiau was not asked to hole out.

Fiddian, who is only twenty-two, started to play in competitive golf at the ago of fifteen, when he entered the boys’ championship. Two years afterwards he won this event, and now he is the youngest player who has held the English title. He lives at Stourbridge in the Midlands, and, though mainly self-taught, he sat at the feet of Michael Bingham, and captured the professional’s knack of hitting the ball a prodigious distance. lie has not yet been chosen as a member of the Walker Cup team who are to visit America in the autumn, but there are still two vacancies, and, after his success at Sandwich, he will probably secure one of these