Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Channel Islands lost their opening golf match at the English Boys Finals after a sterling fightback in the singles by Northampton at King’s Lynn Golf Club yesterday (Tuesday).
Hampshire U18 manager John Moore was looking for his young charges – including Isle of Wight trio Jordan Sundborg (pictured left), Conor Richards and Josh Oddy – to land the first ever English Boys County Championship in 30 years of the competition and was delighted after his boys dominated the morning foursomes.
Hampshire IoW & CI led 2-1 at lunch after debutant Joshua Sturt, from Rowlands Castle, and playing partner Jason Stokes, from La Moye in Jersey, crushed Northamptonshire’s Fergus Robinson and Charlie Salter 7&6, before Shanklin & Sandown’s Sundborg helped Westridge’s England U16 international Oddy to a 3&2 win over Matthew Myers and Thomas Forster in the top match.
Even though Hampshire captain Lawrence Cherry and Conor Richards (pictured right) – the Hampshire Junior Champion who has only played one competitive tournament since an operation on an in-growing toe nail last month – lost the last match by two holes to Norhamptonshire’s Callum Farr and Benjamin Jones, it still left the South East Champions with a crucial advantage going into the afternoon session.
But after a bright start on the first couple of holes, the leaderboard quickly turned into a sea of red for the first time finalists. Oddy was involved in a ding-dong battle at the top of the order with Salter which went all the way to the 18th.
But in the middle order Hampshire’s morning heroes were unable to repeat their success despite that early finish, as first Sturt lost 4&3 to Myers, the Northampton number one, and Stokes was five down with four to play when he shook hands with Farr.
Cherry was unable to lead from the front going down 3&2 to Jones.
That made it 4-3 to the Midlands champions but Sundborg and Richards were hanging on for grim life in the bottom two matches.
First Oddy came from behind to beat Salter by winning the final hole while Richards, a student at Merrist Wood, near Guildford, came from two down with four to play to level the bottom match against Luke Barney, making his debut.
But Sundborg was two down with two to play against Forster and the Shanklin and Sandown teenager, who knocked out England number one Bradley Moore to reach the quarter-finals of the British Boys at Royal Birkdale two weeks ago, used all his recent matchplay experience to snatch the 17th to cut the deficit to just one hole.
A draw for the 18-year-old who made his first team debut for Hampshire IoW & CI just three months ago, would tie the match at 41/2-41/2 as long as Richards could hold on against Barney.
But Sundborg could only halve the last hole as Myers holed a 10-footer to win the point by one hole as Richards was left out last on the course.
Although the runner-up in the British Universities and Colleges Championship at St Andrews earlier this summer did win his match by one on 18, it meant Northamptonshire had taken first blood in the three-day championship, winning 5-4.
The only glimmer of hope for Moore’s team was that Wiltshire also fought back to tie with last year’s runners-up Durham, having lost the foursomes 3-0.
That meant victories over both over the next two days could still swing the title Hampshire’s way – providing – and depending on who – Northampton drop points against in their remaining two matches.
Hampshire will now face Wiltshire today (Wednesday) before their final clash with the Northern Champions Durham on Thursday.
None of the four finalists have ever won the English Boys County Championship before.
You can follow live scores from today’s match and Thursday’s encounter with Durham at https://www.englandgolf.org/golfboxdetails.aspx#/competition/193848/roundrobin
