GOLF

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19057, 9 July 1924, Page 7

GOLF

SPRINGVALE CLUB. DRAW FOB SATURDAY’S BOGEY MATCH. The following is the draw for the bogey match to be played on Saturday next. Players are requested to get in touch with their opponents. W. N. Fuller v. T. H. Rice. B. Runnerstrum v. J. R. Foster. G. R. Robinson v. G. Coull. M. MeArtney v. A. Abernethy. F. Symes v. D. Lilburne. A Lawson v. W. Murchison. A. Doig v. H. Brown. R. D. Smart v. D. McKelvey. A. Delves v. A. E. Whiteford. R. Bock v. P. Higginbottom. Lew Bassett v. W. Therklcson. ! T. Pargeter v. O. Warnock. H. Nettleship v. H. McCready. J. Reynolds v. H. Hassall. C. Gilbert v. P. England. J. McKernan v. L. R. Wills. R. Peattie v. J. Cullinane. C. F. Bruce v. N. H. McNabb. T. bperring v. R. Jackson. L. Young v. V. Evans. A. Lewis v. A. Greener. D. Hewitson v. Dr. Hutson. G. O’Halloran v. T. E. Thomas. S. Swan v. E. Pridhain. C. S. Brown v. R. Goss. B. Jones v. C. Jacobs. I. McNeill v. J. Metson. A. Elliott v. A. Gregson. R. McNiven v. G. Thorpe. Palmer Jones v. E.- Goldsbury. W. Quigley v. F. Broadbent. D. O’Toole v. E. Gilbert. F. Jannings v. C. P. Brown. W. Murray v. F. Wills. F. Shirriffs v. H. Frost. Competitors in the Foster Cup, Runnerstrum Cup and championship events must play off their games by the appointed dates.

RETURN OF HAVERS.

GOLF IN AMERICA. GREAT .BRITAIN’S YOUNG HOPES. There have been several remarkably fine golfing performances during the past lew months, but I think it can be said that the most gratifying—at any rate, from the national point of view—has been the victory of Havers, the British open champion, over Sarazen. probably the best professional goifer in America, in their 72 holes match on the WestchesterBiltmore course at Rye, New York (says R. E. Howard in The Sports man). Havers and Ockenden are now home from their tour of the United States, and, as a result of this triumph on the part of Havers in his final engagement, coupled with the victory which he gained over Bobbie Jones on the latter’s home course at Atlanta, Georgia, three weeks previously, they are returning with flying colours,, whereas a little while ago it seemed certain that they would come back in somewhat chastened circumstances. MORAL INFLUENCE. At the finish Havers has done what very few of us would have backed anyone in this country to accomplish. Jones, that wonderful amateur golfer, who at present holds the U.S. Open Championship, and Sarazen. who has been professional match-player champion of America for two years in succession, must have started warm favourites for their respective matches with the British champion. It seem ed as nearly certain as anything could be that no golfer from abroad could conquer these two men under their own conditions. Havers beat Jones by two and one and Sarazen by five and four. He was three down at the end of the first 36 holes in the latter match, and he must have played like a hero to retrieve the situation, for we are told that in the last round he shot five birdios—which means that at each of five holes he did a stroke better than the par score. Moral effect being a very important influence in golf as well as in most other walks of life. I am sure that he has struck a big blow at th<right time for the maintenance of British supremacy in the Open Cham pionship, which takes place in Holylake and which the Americans had been more than ordinarily confident of regaining prior to these set-backs at the hands of Havers. For the rest, he and Ockenden have played well and ill in patches nor is that circumstance surprising when we recollect the puzzling conditions that confront the visitor to the Southern States, where the “greens” are often of rolled sand, and the Bermuda grass that grows in Texas and other places is of a kind on which only the individual who has been long accustomed to it can hope to excel. Harry Vardon is the only fam ous British golfer who has performed publicly in this part of the world. He was there in 1899 at the height of his glory, and even he lost his matches in Florida to a player named Ben Nicholls —the only occasions on which Vardon was beaton on level terms during a tour which las’ed nearly a year. On the whole. Havers and Ockenden won a creditable proportion of their matches. They were disappointing in several stroke competitions in which they took part, but. it was when they reached as far north as Georgia, where the verdant green courses may be said to start, and the brown sand courses of Florida and Carolina became mere memories, that they produced their best golf, as represented by the performance of Havers. MITCHELL AT HIS BEST. At home we have had another sign of the strength of present-day British professional golf in the form of two brilliant rounds of 71 each by Abe Mitchell in the Southern qualifying competition for the Daily Mail £lOOO Tournament at Fulwell, Middlesex. Mitchell seems to me to be playing with more confidence this season than for a long while past,

especially near the hole. He is at last really swinging his putter instead of lifting it back with something of a jerk, and snatching at the ball at the impact. There are plently of people who say that when he learns to putt effectively his rivals will have no chance with him. Certainly a man who can drive as far as Mitchell, and at the same time keep the ball so straight, ought to be at a tremendous advantage; there is nobody, with the possible exception of J. Barnes, of New York, who has the double virtue of length and accuracy in the same degree as Mitchell. Moreover, he hits his iron shots with the snap and precision of the master, so that nothing can keep him back except an excess of that depressing business which Ray described to me—on one of those rare occasions when he happened to be missing short putts —as “fiddling about the hole.” This fiddling about is usually born of one of two causes; it may be the result of a temperament which tends towards over-anxiety or it may be brought about by a bad style of putting. The former is often incurable; a bad putter frequently makes himself into a good one by adopting sound methods. There is a tendency in some quarters to say that Mitchell feels to excess the strain of a big occasion. What has been much more obvious for years is a principle of putting that has looked unsound —that jab at the ball after he had lifted the club back almost entirely with the right hand. Even in 1919,. when he was getting the ball into the hole better than anyone else, he never appared to be putting well. One always felt that the ball was going to race past the tin —only it went down instead. There is less right hand in his present method, and the improvement in his long putts is especially marked, for he is laying them so close to the hole that. ne has to make a very bad blunder indeed to miss the next. Let us hope that the inspira tion will remain within him, for he is now 37, and it is time that he won his first Open Championship. PRESSING FORWARD. There were encouraging feats by some of the younger players at Fulwell, espcially P. Allis and H. C. Jolly who tied for second place —three strokes behind Mitchell-—and both of whom are appreciably under 30. They have maintained their form excellently during the past few seasons; with the little development that one may reasonably expect in tho case of men who have so many golfing years ahead of them, they ought to become champions. Hard behind them came three others, A. Seymour, G. Gadd, and C. Johns, who have established themselves as constant dangers to the more famous players; they are several years older than Allis and Jolly; in fact, they are about Mitchell’s age —but still young enough to be full of hope. To describe these players as being of the young school! —as people often do—is, perhaps, stretching a point in favour of the sentimental touch. If it be declared justifiable, then another candidate who did remarkably well at Fulwell, J. J. Taylor, deserves to be regarded as a member of the kindergarten school, for he cannot be much more than 20. He won the Assistants’ Tournament last year, and was runner-up in it this season; he has just been appointed professional at Crews Hill, Enfield, and in this, his first big event, with all the Southern cracks among the 115 competitors, he tied for seventh place. He is very small and slight, and his clubs look like toys. Probably his driver weighs about 12oz. And yet he hits tho ball as far as anybody except, perhaps, the strenuous smiters. He is not related to J. H. Taylor, although his golf would make him a credit to the family. SEARCH FOR INTERNATIONALS. Nobody expected that even the combined strength of the North and Midlands would prove equal to the task of defeating the South in tho English trial match at Walton Heath, but I think the match may be said to have justified its institution. It helped, at any rate, to jndicate the provincial players with claims to con sideration, and this hitherto has been largely a matter of conjecture, for the selectors, while well primed with knowledge of Southern form, have known little about the capabilities of the leading northern players. Among these, C. Hodgson, of Yorkshire, and D. E. Souiby, of Lanca shire, accomplished the best feats in the sense that they occupied high places in their side, and won their singles matches. Hodgson defeated C. C. Aylmer by four and three, a success which ought to ensure his appearance in the English team, especially as he has so imposing a record in northern golf. Soulby beat E. N. Layton by two and one—an excellent thing to do anywhere, and an especially good per- ! formance on Layton’s home course. It was his second victory, too, over Layton, whom he knocked out of last year’s amateur championship at Deal. AYLMER HIMSELF AGAIN. Those people who thought that Alymer’s career as an international golfer might be regarded as having been brought to an honourable end at the age of 40 by his defeat in the trial match at Walton Heath were soon provided with another aspect of the situation. Aylmer won the Golf Illustrated Gold Vase at Moor Park in a field of 75 that was thoroughly representative of southern amateur talent. His scores of 80 and 69 may seem to have the elements of extremes, but in point of fact his golf in the first round was just as good as in the aftsjnoon, save that he had three bad holes. He began with a seven, where his ball was in something like quicksand in a bunker. He had another seven at the 14th, where he was in a road, and a six at the last hole, where he took four putts from 30 yards. For the other 15 holes his morning score was an average of fours. In the afternoon he played 16 consecutive holes without making the slightest mistake. Clearly he is not yet a back number.