Hard luck to managers Colm Mulcahy & Eddie Lonergan whose Barton Cup team came up short this afternoon in the fourth round of this Leinster competition.
It looked like it might be a tricky tie with three away matches and so it turned out to be.
Away from home it looked like our first pair of Colm Mulcahy & Ben Crowley were in for a tough match after losing the first but they were still very much in the game after nine, just one down. Loses on ten, eleven and thirteen however saw them four down and in definite bother.
Our second away pair of Collie Dunne & Trevor Philips were in even deeper trouble, losing the ninth to turn three down, Collie & Trevor never recovered and a loss by a margin of 5&4 gave Royal Curragh their first point of the day.
Our final pairing at Royal Curragh of Chris Boylan & Rob Tierney were fairing somewhat better, winning the eighth to turn one up.
Meanwhile back home in Greystones Our first pair out of Martin Nolan & John Egan struggled at the beginning of the round and let their opposition get a three hole lead after three holes. While it is a truism that this is the best place to find yourself three down it is certainly not what you might wish for. Martin & John got it back to all square by the eighth tee box but lost eight to go one down. They played the ninth well and had two putts to win with a par which they duly did and so headed down the tenth all square. Holes were swapped and the match was still all square on the thirteenth tee box where John found trouble off the tee box and the Curragh pair had split the fairway. We struggled on the hole from there on in while the low man from Royal Curragh hit a quality approach shot to the green to set up a win. On fourteen, once again the Royal Curragh low man hit another quality iron shot to five feet while we found the bunker off the tee. A good bunker shot by John wasn’t going stem this particular tide as the Curragh player knocked in his birdie putt for the win and to put us two down in the match. The fifteenth was halved in sixes before a par on sixteen sealed the match for Royal Curragh.
Two nil to Royal Curragh at this point…..
Second out in Greystones were Pete Anderson & Toby Murphy. Pete & Toby started solidly with a spectacular up n’ down on the first for a half, followed by a good win on the second. This was always going to be a tight match and by the tenth tee it was still all square, both pairs having traded holes on the opening nine. An errant tee shot from Toby to the left of eleven left Pete facing a practically impossible shot, under a tree and over the bunker while the opposition had hit the green off the tee. One down …
The twelfth was halved, and Pete & Toby let their opposition away with one on the thirteenth after a lovely iron approach shot from Pete had us in pole position. Uncharacteristically, Toby raced his birdie putt five feet beyond the hole and with Pete missing the return putt, the hole was halved. Royal Curragh hit a great tee shot to fourteen while we missed the green long right. A nice chip by Toby was followed by a gutsy putt by Pete to get, a perhaps unlikely, half and make up for the pairs’ error on thirteen. We were in trouble on fifteen however and lost the hole to go two down again and when Royal Curragh hit the sixteenth green and we were in the bunker short left it looked ominous.
As this was unfolding, away from home, Chris & Rob were still in the driving seat at one up playing eighteen and Colm & Ben had fought back to win four holes on the trot to be all square after the eighteen holes and were heading down nineteen.
On the sixteenth in Greystones, Toby hit a decent bunker shot and Royal Curragh hit their putt to three feet below the hole. Pete’s tricky putt across the green missed and when Toby missed the return it was as good as over. Colm & Ben were called in, as were Chris & Rob.
4:1 to Royal Curragh.
Hard luck to Colm, Eddie and all the squad who all put in a great deal of effort during this campaign.
