STARS FROM AROUND THE WORLD READY TO SHINE AT FAIRHAVEN

NEW ZEALAND witb World No 1 Lydia Ko, end right on back row, and World No 2 Cecilia Cho in front of her in the front row (image by Cal Carson Golf A

Great Britain and Ireland team bidding to maintain a 100 per cent record in home Astor Trophy matches - left to right, Back row - Kelsey MacDonald, Holly Clyburn, Kelly Tidy. Front row: Pamela Pretswell, captain Tegwen Matthews, Amy Boulden (mage by Cal Carson Golf Agency).

                                                                     THE CANADIAN TEAM
                                                      

By COLIN FARQUHARSON

Colin@scottishgolfview.com

Kelsey MacDonald (Nairn Dunbar) and Pamela Pretswell (Bothwell Castle) give Scotland a double interest in the Great Britain team of five for the once-every-four-years Astor Trophy women’s amateur international team golf tournament which tees off at Fairhaven Golf Club, Lytham St Annes on Wednesday morning.

For Kelsey it will be the first time she has played for a GB team. Pamela played in last year’s Curtis Cup and the Vagliano Trophy match the year before that.

England’s Holly Clyburn (Woodhall Spa) and Kelly Tidy (Royal Birkdale), and Wales’ Amy Boulden (Maesdu) complete the home line-up, captained by Cardiff-born Tegwen Matthews who will also skipper the GB and I team for next June’s Curtis Cup match at Nairn.

The Astor Trophy, which used to be known as the Commonwealth Tournament, brings together for five days of round-robin match-play the teams of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and an-all Britain line-up.

Ireland put a ban on their leading players being selected, pleading they needed a week off between the British championship at Royal Portrush last week and next week’s Vagliano Trophy match at Royal Porthcawl.             

New Zealand will start favourites on paper because their team includes whiz kids Lydia Ko (only 14) and Cecilia Cho (16), Nos 1 and 2 in the Women’s World Amateur Rankings.

But Ko and Cho are not invincible as was proved in last week’s “British” where both were beaten in the second round.

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Chloe Simpson, 19-year-old daughter of Carnoustie-born Susan Simpson, the LGU’s Tournament Director, and fellow Glasgow music student Daniel Douglas (pictured above) sang the national anthems of the five participating countries - some of them in the language of that nation, as the five captains raised the flags at the opening ceremony (Tegwen Matthews is picture above raising the Union Jack. Image by Cal Carson Golf Agency) 

Captain Matthews has paired her Scots together – Pamela Pretswell and Kelsey MacDonald going out in the second morning pairing in Britain’s opening match against Australia.Their opponents are Breanna Elliott and Ashley Ona who did well in the recent St Rule Trophy tournament at St Andrews.

Kelly Tidy and Amy Boulden will form an English-Welsh partnership against Emma de Groot and Minjee Lee.

England’s Holly Clyburn was left out of the pre-lunch foursomes but all five players have to play in the afternoon singles.

Skipper Tegwen said: “I’ve got five talented individual players in my team and I have every confidence that they will blend as a team capable of doing very well in match-play.”

OPENING MATCHES

SOUTH AFRICA v NEW ZEALAND

FOURSOMES

08.00 Bertine Strauss and Henriette Frylinck v Emily Perry and Chantelle Cassidy.

08.10 Kim Williams and Illiska Verwey v. Lydia Ko and Cecilia Cho.

AUSTRALIA v GB and I

FOURSOMES

08.20 Emma de Groot and Minjee Lee v Kelly Tidy and Amy Boulden.

08.30 Breanna Elliott and Ashley Ona v Pamela Pretswell and Kelsey MacDonald.

Afternoon programme of 10 singles (five S Africa v NZ, and five Australia v GBand I) tee off from 12.30.

THURSDAY
GB and I v South Africa
Canada v NZ

FRIDAY
NZ v Australia.
Canada v South Africa.

SATURDAY

Australia v Canada.

NZ v GB and I

SUNDAY (final day)

GB and I v Canada.

South Africa v Australia.

+The Astor Trophy is run on a league table basis, not sudden-death match-play, so a country could lose a match and still top the final table at the end of Sunday's play.

                                                          SOUTH AFRICA

                                                           AUSTRALIA