Jasmine Mackintosh beats defending champion in Women's Amateur at Prince's

Jasmine Macintosh, winner of the Helen Holm Scottish Women’s Open earlier in the year, held off a gutsy late fightback to beat defending champion Jess Baker in the Women’s Amateur Championship in Kent.

In their last-64 tie at Prince’s, Murcar Links member Mackintosh was four up with six holes to play before hanging on to win on the last green.

“Relief after all that. It was a stressful match but good,” said the Scot of her hard-earned victory, which set up a match against Germany’s Chiara Horder at the Sandwich venue on Friday morning.

Baker, who plays her golf at Gosforth Park, beat Hannah Darling in the semi-finals last year en route to landing The R&A title at Hunstanton in Norfolk last year.

Murcar Links member Jasmine Mackintosh in action during this week's R&A Women's Amateur Championship at Prince's Golf Club in Sandwich. Picture: Tom Dulat/R&A/R&A via Getty Images.

“She fought hard all the way to the end. She's a great player,” said Mackintosh of her opponent, who played in all three rounds in this year’s Augusta National Women’s Amateur and also finished in the top ten in the recent St Rule Trophy in St Andrews.

“I was four up with six to play and then ended up on the 18th. I went in a couple bunkers and she holed a few putts and that turned the tables a bit, as match play tends to be like that a lot. But I was thinking to myself ‘I'm still up’ and that's kind of what helped me get through.”

Seeing who she’d be facing after successfully negotiating the 36-hole stroke-play qualifying earlier in the weekend had galvanised Mackintosh.

“It's inspiring,” she insisted. “It's a good challenge to know that you can try and beat somebody who already went the whole way and won.”

In the Helen Holm Scottish Women’s Open, Mackintosh beat Lorna McClymont in a play-off to land a significant success at Royal Troon.

“That boosted my confidence a lot,” she admitted. “Just got to keep it going. I do like match play. Whatever happened before doesn't really matter afterwards.”

Broomieknowe’s Hannah Darling also progressed to the last 32 after having to dig deep to beat Swede Nathalie Borg, who’d won a preliminary round match earlier in the day, on the last green.

Darling, a two-time semi-finalist, now meets American Annabelle Pancake while others still standing include world No 1 Ingrid Lindblad from Swede and leading qualifier Beth Coulter from Ireland.