Paddy takes President's Day title at Royal

With almost 150 golfers turning out to compete for the Cup a close finish was on the cards. Paddy A O’Donnell and Richard Gallaugher duly obliged by returning excellent 39s and, accordingly, countback had to be resorted to.

This established Paddy as the winner with his 20 back, one better than Richard. Paddy birdied 2, 10 and 16 to help balance a few bogies. Richard had an impressive eagle on the par five second but had a few more bogies on the outward nine and carded a double bogey on the twelfth which did not help his cause at all.

John McLean had 12 points on his card after the ninth, including no scores at 1, 4, and 7 and double bogeys at 5 and 6.

This would normally be the point where you stop counting and concentrate on whatever match you had going with your partners. Not so with John who birdied the tenth, with a handicap shot scoring four points, and the thirteenth.

This together with steady scoring for the rest of the round gave him an incredible 25 for the back nine, 37 points overall and third place in the tournament.

Scratch handicap John Turner double bogeyed the first and the eleventh but had five birdies as well to submit a score of 71 to take the best gross prize for the day.

A word for Gary Stevenson who dropped in a hole in one at the third - the bar would have been that bit busier when he got in!