Gloucestershire Golf Union
Gloucestershire Senior Team WIN against Devon 9/6
The Gloucestershire Senior Team travelled to Saunton Golf Club for their latest Channel League match against Devon. Despite travel chaos on Sunday the Team made a practice round on the challenging but excellent East Course.
An early start on match day saw the dream team of Tim Clink and Nigel Gravelle lead the way in the foursomes. Birdies followed and with a two hole lead with three to play the first point was looking assured. However, an excellent birdie from Devon on the 7th tightened the match with two to go. The match went down the last with Clink and Gravelle 1 up. An excellent drive from Clink led to a superb angle for the second shot but Gravelle knifed the second shot wide of the green. A comedy act followed with pair playing the hole like 18 handicappers losing it to a bogey for a halved match. More pain on the last was to follow in the next two matches. New pairing of Chris Newman and Steve Yorke were one up with two to play but the opposition birdied the penultimate hole to square the match. Good drives at the last saw Gloucestershire playing first to the heart of the green and when the Devon pairing mis-hit their second shot the initial thought was a win was in the bag. But with the ground hard and the course running fast, the ball made its way onto the green and up to six feet from the pin. A solid two putt from Gloucester left Devon with a birdie opportunity which they duly took for an unlikely win. In the third match Nick Barwood and Tim Rogers overcame their poor form from the practice round, to lead throughout their match, but still stood on the last tee all square. Devon once again won the last to secure another 1 hole victory. So the first three matches had all lost the last for the team to go from a commanding position to a 2 point deficit. The fourth match saw debutant Ian Foster and Dave Law together. Another tight match ensued but again it was edged by Devon by one hole and being 3.5-0.5 down, things were looking somewhat desperate for Gloucestershire. A win was required in the last match of the morning to give any chance of a Gloucestershire victory and this was duly delivered by Ken Madden and Andy Wright taking the Devon pairing to the last for a one hole victory. 3.5 – 1.5 in Devons favour at lunchtime and much work would be required by Gloucestershire in the afternoon singles.
Needing a fast start Gloucestershire were led away in the singles by Nigel Gravelle, but fast it was not and Nigel cursed his bad luck losing 3&2. Chris Newman, playing second, delivered the first much needed singles win and when Steve Yorke won the third match, things were looking up. Unfortunately, skipper Tim Clink played appallingly to lose to an opponent who was well over par and he was feeling fairly depressed about the team result having been told the remaining six matches were “down in three and all square in three” after nine holes. A revival was needed and it certainly came! Tim Rogers got an excellent half with Paul Newcombe, followed by fine victories for Nick Barwood, Dave Law, Ian Foster and Andy Wright. When Ken Madden delivered the blow that felled the Devon skipper in the last match, a 9-6 victory was secured. This was an excellent effort from the team who all delivered at least half a point and provide that the team can compete at this level. If only the two 8-7 losses from earlier in the season had gone in Gloucestershire’s favour, we would be top of the Channel League!
Thanks to Saunton for being excellent hosts.
Tim Clink - Senior Captain
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