STC match v RQ at BGC yesterday – a 4.5/1.5 win!

3. The match of the day proved to be Peter Martin versus the very dapper Brad Dalton (with his bright red pork pie hat). Both players were having a day out to the point where after ten holes they were both two under the card with seven birdies between them and Peter one up. From that point the golf dropped off a little but the match remained tight with Marto prevailing on the second last hole, at which point he was only one over the card, for a 2/1 win

4. In the final singles match both players were on a six handicap meaning that there would be no strokes given. It was Clint Auty up against Paul Cooper. Clint played really solid golf early to get to six up at one stage with Cooper having no answer.  On the second nine Clint went off the boil somewhat but was steady enough to win 3/2. Protecting a big lead can at times be difficult when the opponent starts hitting their straps so Clint did very well to keep his head

5. Darryl Stuckey and Ian Brereton played the first 4bbb match against RQ captain Roger Jones and the irrepressible Craig Laggaroth. The RQ pair were the recipients of two and four shots respectively.  One of the highlights of the match (or should I say lowlights?) was on the very first hole.  Darryl hit a very poor drive and was seemingly in no position to have a meaningful result on the hole. He decided that, being match play, he may as well hang in there and so bunted the ball down towards the green and made a bogey on one of the easiest holes on the course. As it turned out, none of the other three players could better a seven and so Darryl’s six won the hole – go figure! Ian didn’t have a great start to the match and it wasn’t until the 5th hole that he put together some good shots.  He knocked his second on the index one hole to 20 feet and it looked like it would be an easy hole win to BGC. Unfortunately Ian was a bit aggressive with his first putt and his three putt meant the hole was halved. The reason I mention this unfortunate turn of events is because of what happened on the very next hole.  This time Ian knocked his second pin high for another 20 footer but this time it was a treacherous downhill putt. He stroked the ball and both Darryl and I thought he would need his wedge to play his next shot from 15 metres off the green. But it was not to be as Ian’s putt hit the pin and dropped in for a magnificent winning birdie. Even though Darryl was out of sorts with his iron play the BGC boys held on for a solid 2/1 win.

6. The final match had Graeme Buckland and big hitting Geoff Crozier up against Brendan Forster and David Banks. The BGC players received four and three shots respectively. The first hole was halved in solid birdies and I thought that this was going to be a high quality match. Croz was hitting the ball well and Bucko was similar, but unfortunately we lacked the most important ingredient of match play golf – putting from inside ten feet.  The BGC twosome missed eight putts from within that range whereas RQ holed that many, with Banks in particular having a very good short game. BGC went down 2/1