Paul Keane and his Eamonn Darcy team headed to Woodbrook this morning to play the first round robin match in the 2022 competition. Traditionally this competition tends to be played in cold driving rain or worse, but today despite a misty start the matches were played in bright sunshine.
Club President, Neville Galloway saw the team off with our foursomes pairing of Eddie Lonergan & Chris Boylan the first to play. The pair started well and were two up at the turn. Unfortunately, losses on the tenth and eleventh saw their match back to all square.
Due to the late arrival of one of the Woodbrook players the singles matches went out after Eddie & Chris. Leading the singles charge was team captain, David Byrne. David, leading by example, played some great golf and established a three hole advantage after six. He never relinquished this lead and held a twenty footer on the 11th to move to four up before closing his match out on the fourteenth 5&4.
Our second singles player was Shane O’Connor who was in a tight match for the opening holes but a loss on the sixth saw him go one down and by the twelfth tee box he found himself three down. On the fourteenth his opposition chipped in from the fringe to go four up and a half on the fifteenth was enough for a Woodbrook win 4&3.
One all ….
The third singles match saw Dylan Holmes take on an experienced Woodbrook player and, as with Shane’s match the early stages of Dylan’s match were nip and tuck. An errant tee shot which found OB on the tenth however, followed by another loss on the eleventh saw Dylan three down.
Meanwhile, our last match had Brian Frawley & Diarmaid McGabhann paired up after a last minute injury to Niall Gaffney. A slow start had our pair two down after three but a win on the fourth steadied the ship and by the fourteenth they were two up and playing well.
While this was been played out Eddie and Chris saw Eddie’s putt from the fringe on fourteen shave the hole resulting in a loss and from there they were unable to claw their way back into the match despite their best efforts and unfortunately lost 3&2.
So now we had lost two, won one, Dylan was three down but fighting hard to stay in the match and Diarmaid & Brian had their noses just in front.
Dylan won the thirteenth to go back to two down and hit a great approach shot to the fourteenth. Two putts were all he needed to win the hole after an uncharacteristic failure by his opponent to get up and down from the fringe. Woodbrook claimed the fifteenth, back to two down for Dylan and sixteen saw Dylan having to dig deep to win the hole and get the match back to one down. Dylan’s tee shot on the tricky par three, seventeenth was taken right by the wind and he found himself on the fringe while the Woodbrook player hit a great shot in to 15 feet. Holding his nerve Dylan chipped to a foot and a two putt from his opposite number saw the hole halved and they headed to the eighteenth teebox with Dylan still one down.
Back on the fourteenth Diarmaid and Brian made a good half but a trip to the trees off the tee on the fifteenth resulted in a loss for the pair. Back to just one up.
On the eighteenth Dylan had found the fairway while the Woodbrook player was up ahead but in the fairway bunker. Dylan hit great approach shot to a very tricky pin position and was left with ten feet to the pin, albeit with a big break. His opposition did well to make the green from the bunker but looked like he might be in three putt territory and indeed this turned out to be the case. Dylan rolled the ball to beside the hole and claimed a halved match – a great fight back.
Diarmaid & Brian knew then that their match was key and made a great half on the par five sixteenth ( despite being out of position after their second shot ) to stay one up when teeing it up on the par three seventeenth. Woodbrook hit a super tee shot to eight feet while Diarmaid’s tee shot came up short. Our pair made a fantastic up and down to halve the hole and we moved to the eighteenth for the match deciding hole.
Woodbrook chose to take an iron off the tee for safety while Brian opted to go with his driver. Both players found the fairway however Greystones had a thirty yard advantage for the second shot. Woodbrook played a very good shot to fifteen feet but Diarmaid followed with a fantastic shot to eight feet and crucially he had found the right tier on the green.
Two putts each and thank you very much, another win on the day for Greystones and a halved overall match 2.5 / 2.5.
Well done to all involved.
