Surrey Women's Golf
National Finals, so close…
How much closer could it have been? Surrey played some fantastic golf but were denied the National County Champions title by Nottinghamshire. In an extremely rare occurrence, a county had remained undefeated but lost the title on game points. Everyone in the Surrey camp was devastated, so close and yet so far!
Going into Sunday's final round at Stover, the Surrey Pinkies had high hopes . Surrey were level with Nottinghamshire on 7 match points and the team knew that they had to win their final match against Buckinghamshire by the largest possible margin, ideally 5-0, and Nottinghamshire had to slip up against Lancashire or win by at least half a point less than us. The morning's play was due to get underway at 8.30am but there had been a lot of rain overnight and we arrived at the club in torrential rain. The course was flooding but the forecast was for the rain to move away and so a two hour suspension of play was announced. Playing Uno and making Tik Tok videos amused the Pinkies!
True to the forecast the rain stopped and the greens staff swept the greens, the course was playable. The matches teed off and so began an afternoon of highs and lows and considerable stress! At one point, it looked as though the Surrey Pinkies might falter against Buckinghamshire. However, Surrey took first blood as Maty Santilli closed out an early and very impressive 6&5 win in match four (second singles). In match one, the first foursomes pairing of Emily Peaford and Katie Laud, came back strongly from one down on the 16th tee to tie the match with a birdie on 17, before winning the 18th to take the match 1up. The second pairing of Lottie Woodham and Mia Ingham struggled and finally succumbed 3&2. Annabel Peaford in the first singles match had a tough time watching her opponent hole putt after putt. She battled valiantly and there was never more than two holes in it. Surrey spirits soared as Annabel won the 17th to go all square but the optimism was short lived, her opponent hit the ball to 2 feet on the last, birdied the hole and won the match. Meanwhile, Herry Ji played some fabulous golf in her singles match and came out victorious 3&2. So Surrey had beaten Buckinghamshire 3-2.
Meanwhile, what of the tussle between Nottinghamshire and Lancashire? For the early part of the match it looked as though Lancashire had a good grip on their opponents and there was considerable hope that they could snatch a victory. At the halfway point, they were up in two, down in two and tied in the fifth match. However, there was no more than one hole between the players in any match. Sadly, things began to turn and Nottinghamshire fought back. Ultimately they took victory 4-1. The dream of winning National Finals was over for the Surrey Pinkies
Created by intelligentgolf version 10.1.2.
