ON TARANAKI GOLF LINKS

Taranaki Daily News, 16 October 1931, Page 3

ON TARANAKI GOLF LINKS

CHAMPIONSHIP CONTESTS IN AND OUT PLAY AT WAIWAKAIHO FINALS AT ELTHAM AND WAITARA. (By “Stance.”) Though not ideal, the weather conditions for the first qualifying round of the New Plymouth Golf Club’s 1931 championships at Waiwakaiho on Saturday last were anything but trying. Certainly the wind made the tenth hole very hard, but was not strong enough to inconvenience players at any other hole. But as is often the case in qualifying rounds, the scores were very disappointing and few players displayed their true form. The provincial champion, A. S. Hasell, led the field with a soundly played 77. He was out in 40 and home in 37 after starting with a six at the tenth. His play was characterised by soundness on and around the greens, especially over the last eight holes. Frank Quin continued -with the good form he had shown at Wanganui the previous week and returned the next best, 80. However, he played better golf than the score might indicate. The Waitara player W. H. Fuller was next with a steady 83, followed by Chong with 84. The Stratford champion N. P. Green was going well until the last three holes, where he threw away five or six strokes to finish with an 85. The holder of the title, A. E. Conway, started by holing a thirty footer at "the first, but afterwards completely lost touch with his putter and had to be content with an 80.

While the senior scores were disappointing. some of the junior players did remarkably well. T. A. Thomson with 85 was the best, and this score might easily have been many strokes better with a little luck. He commenced with seven at the first, but even then reached the ninth with a three "for a 39, but fell and had to be content with a 41. The tenth cost him another seven, and he was home in 44. Hawkins and Strombom both played well. Hawkins was. out in 42 and Strombom in 44, and though the latter picked up one stroke coming home Hawkins’ card was 88 to his 89. Other good cards in this division were V. Duff and K. Tompkins’ 92. The latter might have broken 90 but for becoming over anxious at the sixteenth and seventeenth.

Out For Recovery To-morrow. There are few in the big field of over 90 who are not fully convinced that they can do a great deal better in the second round and are all out to prove it tomorrow. They may or they may not do better, but if they go off with the full intention of burning up the course they certainly will not. Qualifying rounds are not played that way. One has just to play round and wait for the good holes to come; it is quite useless chasing them at every hole. We are not all Bobby Joneses. At" last the Coltman Cup competition has reached, finality and it still remains in the possession of last year’s winner, G. W. Haughton, who defeated C. Walker by the narrow margin of one up during the week-end. The game was very closely contested all the way and the players were never more than two holes apai’t. The golf going out was very good. The first was halved in fours, but a good four at the second put Haughton into the lead, Walker immediately retaliating by winning the third in a similar figure. Another four gave Haughton the fourth, but after the fifth had been halved in fives Walker again squared the gam'e by winning The Dell with a three. The seventh -was halved and then Walker went to the lead by winning the eighth.

The ninth and tenth were halved but then Walker put two shots over the fence at the eleventh and Haughton had no difficulty in winning with a five. Walker, however, won the twelfth with a nice three, and after the next had been halved should have won Moses, where Haughton took three to reach the green and then sank a long one for a four, and Walker, taking three putts, could only obtain a half. A good four at the fifteenth, however, gave him a win and put him in the strong position of being two up with three to play. The luck was against him again at the sixteenth, where Haughton’s putter again functioned, and he scraped a win where a loss seemed likely. Walker again played weakly at the seventeenth and'the game was square. At the last hole Walker had the misfortune to have to play a critical shot to the green with his ball right in front of a tussock, and this proved fatal. Walker was undoubtedly unlucky to have lost, for if he could, have putted or if his bpponent had failed with even one of his fifteen-footers the result would have been different. But of course that is golf, and possibly next time the boot may be on the other foot. Unlucky Player at Eltham.

There is no doubt that when it comes to championships Leo Abbott is one of the unluckiest players in golf, and the final of the Eltham championship last week only went to provide another example. Abbott apparently had the game won when Wills suddenly staged a grandstand finish and took the last three holes in birdie figures to snatch the title. Both gave great exhibitions of golf all day, more especially in the afternoon, and the cards were well w’orthy of a championship final. Wills has been close to the title once before, and he is a powerful player 1 with a fine match temperament. Nevertheless Abbott’s turn must come; he cannot go on knocking at the door for ever. Bobby Jones had seven tries before he could win an American championship, but then he never stopped collecting them. The Fuller brothers suffered extinction in the two Manakorihi finals played last week-end, W. H. failing to sustain his early advantage against Glasgow in the senior event and W. R. having perhaps the worst of the luck against Clayton.

The senior final produced excellent golf on a course that is beginning to show a good deal of surplus growth, Glasgow’s score for the 32 holes played being 143. He was a bit shaky at the beginning, and judging from Fuller’s performances at Belmont and at Waiwakaiho the previous day it seemed that the Urenui man would have his name engraved a second time on the senior shield. Fuller’s second nine took him 44, however, while Glasgow settled down and putted like a champion, finishing the match with two bogeys into the wind at Westward and Paritutu and a. birdie 4 with it at Skyline. Wonderful Record of Success. Glasgow, who has now won the senior championship eight times in the last 11 years, is apparently devoid of any semblance of a match temperament. Nothing seemed to worry him, not even a perfect stymie on the Sth green the third time "round. Unable to putt round it, he produced a. niblick shot that hit the back of the hole neatly on the full and plopped in. In other departments of the game the honours were even. The intermediate finalists had their ups and downs and no fewer than three

times there was a remarkable change in the fortunes of the match. Clayton was erratic in the fairway to begin and lost the first two, a handicap he could not make up all morning. Fuller was playing steadily except for lapses at the 12th and 13th, where he picked up. The afternoon round provided the suriprises. Clayton won the. first four holes with steady play, although Fuller was not approaching well. Then, having established a lead for the first time, he lost control of his driver and baffie and conceded 6 of the next nine holes. That left Fuller 4 up and 5, but still another reversal was to come, and Clayton, won three holes in 5,3, 5, halved the 35th in 5, w’on the home hole in 5 and went on to win the 37th luckily. Fuller’s weak spot was his approaching, and that was accounted for by the fact that he was playing the first game on his home course for"a fortnight, he having had experience of Belmont and Waiwakaiho in the interim. That, coupled with the worst of the luck in regard, to lies and a debit balance in stymies, was just enough to rob Fuller of victory.