Henderson qualifies for the final of the Faldo Series Europe

LOTHIANS golfer Neil Henderson has claimed a spot in the Faldo Series Europe Grand Final for a second time.

The Glen player won both the overall and the boys' under-21 sections at the Faldo Series UK Championship at The Roxburghe to earn a trip to the Lough Erne Resort in Northern Ireland later in the year.

Henderson, a student at Old Dominion University in America, shot rounds of 73 and 69 for an impressive two-under par total of 142 at the Kelso course.

That gave him a three-stroke victory over Craig Ross (Kirkhill) and Lothians Boys' champion Simon Fairburn (Galashiels) for the overall prize and a four-shot win over Dunbar's Danny Kay and Andrew Wallace (Glenbervie) in the under-21 event.

Ross and Fairburn both signed for rounds of 73 and 72 to share first place in the under-18 event, two shots ahead of Craigielaw's Grant Forrest.

Fairburn birdied the 422-yard par-4 18th to force a tie but succumbed to a birdie-3 on the first hole of the subsequent sudden-death play-off.

The Roxburghe is proving a happy hunting ground for Henderson, who won the won the under-18 title in the same event there in 2007 to qualify for the Grand Final. The highlight of his second round on this occasion was an eagle on the 546-yard par-5 fifth, while he also bounced back from dropping a shot on the 469-yard par-4 tenth with three birdies over the closing stretch.

Joining Henderson at the Grand Final on 21-23 September will be boys' under-18 winner Ross, boys' under-16 winner Ewan Scott and Alison Goodwin and Lesley Atkins, who won the girls' under-21 and under-16 events respectively.

Scott, the first Scot to win the English Boys' Under-14 Stroke Play Championship, fired rounds of 76 and 72 to win his section. Alison Goodwin (Glenbervie) produced a second round of 72 to emerge a clear winner in her event while Atkins, who now plays out of Gullane, carded rounds of 75 and 79 to finish six shots ahead of North Berwick's Clara Young.