Roseanne Niven finishes runner

-up in Irish open stroke-play

FROM COLIN FARQUHARSON
Perthshire teenager Roseanne Niven was the only British player to make the semi-finals of the recent British women's open amateur golf championship at North Berwick.
Now the 19-year-old member at Crieff Golf Club and a student at the University of California-Berkeley has finished runner-up to Welsh Curtis Cup player Breanne Loucks in the Irish women's open amateur stroke-play championship which finished at Elm Park Golf Club, Dublin today.
Which is a trifle embarrassing for the Scotland selectors, who, in fairness, made their choice some time BEFORE the "British" championship and named Roseanne as first RESERVE for the squad of six to play in the European women's team championship in Sweden from July 8 to 12.
"I am a better all-round player than I was before I went to college in America," said Roseanne (picture above by Cal Carson Golf Agency (all rights reserved), who won the Scottish Under-18 girls' match-play championship at Peebles in 2006.
"I have a short-game coach in California and Karyn Dallas at Kirriemuir is my coach when I am at home.
Niven, picture above by Cal Carson Golf Agency (all rights reserved), whose family home is at Tibbermore near Perth, finished in grand style in Ireland with birdies at the 16th and 18th to come thundering up through the field with a final round of three-under-par 70 - three better than title-winner Breanne Loucks, also 19, from Wrexham.
Loucks totalled five-under-par 214, having shot earlier rounds of 69 and 72 to have a clear lead on Saturday night.
Roseanne scored 73 and 74 in the first and second rounds.
The next best Scots on the final leaderboard were Louise Kenney (Pitreavie), joint 14th on 227 and Glasgow University student Pamela Pretswell (Bothwell Castle), tied 18th on 229.
The remarkable Maguire 13-year-old twins - Lisa and Leona - continue to impress. Leona beat Lisa in the final of the Irish WOMEN'S amateur match-play championship two or three weeks ago. At Elm Park it was Lisa's turn to finish ahead of her sibling, sharing third place with England's Charlotte Wild, whose 69 was the best of the final day, on 219. Leona came joint fifth.
They are being tipped already for a place in the GB&I team in the Curtis Cup match in the States in 2010.
North-east of Scotland golf enthusiasts will get a chance to watch the Maguire girls in action for Ireland in the European girls' team championship at Murcar Links the week after next.
Scotland (459) came a disappointing sixth of eight in the international team event won by Wales (439) from Ireland (440) and England (444).
Roseanne Niven, whose family home is at Tibbermore near Perth, was not a member of the Scotland team.
Her 16 year old sister Annabel is playing for Perthshire & Kinross in the three-day North Division women's inter-county team championship at Downfield. Annabel will also be Scotland's representative in the forthcoming R&A Junior Open for Under-16s at Hesketh Golf Club, Lancashire a few days before the Open championship at Royal Birkdale.
Roseanne has accepted an invitation - alongwith Curtis Cup player Carly Booth (Comrie) - from the Ladies European Tour to play in the Ladies English Women's Open at The Oxfordshire Golf Club this coming weekend.