Scottish Boys Championship golf: St Andrews player bids for historic victory

Ten years after meeting Lawrie when the Aberdonian launched the St Andrews Links Junior Golf Association (SALJGA) in the home of golf, the 16-year-old will today bid to become the first player from the Auld Grey Toun to land the title since Lachlan Carver achieved the feat at Dunbar in 1960.

Standing in his way in the 36-hole final at Murcar Links is Craig Howie, a 17-year-old from Peebles who reckons he was never built to be a rugby player, played football for a while but eventually plumped for golf and is now one win away from becoming the first player to have entered from a Borders club to claim this crown.

On a day on the north-east coast when the reek from some muckspreading on a neighbouring farm proved as much a problem as a bitterly cold wind howling in off the North Sea, Scott looked to be in a stinker of a position in his morning match against Blairgowrie’s Bradley Neil, who covered the opening five holes in two-under to be four up.

The complexion of the match soon changed, though, as the Fifer won three in a row from the sixth and, after squaring matters with a birdie at the 13th, the talented duo boarded the last tee locked together.

It was advantage Neil after their approach shots at the par-4, even more so when Scott, a Madras College pupil, came up ten feet short with a weak pitch. But, after Neil had left his first putt from 25 feet about five feet shy, Scott rolled his one in, punching the air in delight as it dropped, and then watched his opponent miss. “It was a bit of a battle out there,” observed Scott of that contest, which he followed up with a 2 and 1 afternoon success against Cowglen’s Alan Waugh, who had recovered from being two down with four to play to win his quarter-final joust on the last green against Lewis Bain, the Lothians Boys’ champion from Turnhouse.

While the aforementioned Carver beat Sandy Wilson in an all-St Andrews final to claim his title triumph more than 50 years ago, notable successes in national events have been few and far between for the Fife town’s finest amateurs since then.

“I don’t know why that is,” admitted Scott, who is coached by Steve North at the St Andrews Links Golf Academy. “It’s not as though there are a shortage of good golfers – in fact, there are plenty of good golfers in St Andrews.”

Many of them have benefited from the launch of SALJGA ten years ago, when Scott, who was six at the time, had just taken up the game – older brother Cammie is the only other member of his family who plays – and savoured getting the chance to meet Lawrie, who was the guest of honour for the occasion.

“I’ll never forget that day,” added the plus two player. “We played the first two holes on the Balgove course and he chatted to us. Now it might be fate if he hands me the trophy here.”

Howie will have something to say about that and he’s certainly not lacking when it comes to courage, having dug himself out of a fair few holes on the north-east coast to set up his crack at the title.

Though Craig Hislop, originally from Selkirk, lifted the title in 1991, he played at Powfoot, situated in the SGU’s South Area, then. The last Borders player to be in the final, therefore, was technically another Selkirk man, Murray Cleghorn, in 1964.

“It is a pretty rare occasion for a Borders player to be in this position,” acknowledged Howie, who may play most of his golf at Peebles but has been honing his links skills for this particular test at Craigielaw, where he is also a member.

Like Scott, Howie staged a stirring morning fightback, beating Buckpool’s Jake Scott at the 19th after finding himself four down after five as his opponent birdies three holes in a row from the fifth. “It’s the sort of course that you know you can stage comebacks, as I’ve proved on more than one occasion this week,” said Howie, who is coached by Colin Brooks. In the afternoon, Howie was approximately level-par – splendid scoring in the testing conditions – as he ended the brave run of Caird Park’s Connar Cook, who had recovered from losing the second to hold the upper hand for most of the way as he edged past Alva’s Lawrence Allan in his last-eight tussle.

Like many of the competitors this week, Howie has been staying at a hotel close to the course. While the finalist wasn’t holding out much hope of his dad, Rab, giving up the biggest bed they’ve been sharing, he was at least hoping to get a good night’s kip without being woken by the irritating noise of texts being sent to his old man’s phone.

When he revealed they arrived to the sound of a JCB reversing, it was easy to understand what he was getting at.