Royton Sword double for experienced England international
FORMAT: 36-hole stroke play
England international Jack Brooks has no intention of giving up on his golfnews24 Northern Order of Merit title without a fight and moved into third in the overall standings thanks to a victory in the Royton Sword yesterday.
The Bolton-based player won the Crompton and Royton event last year and retained his title in impressive fashion. Turton’s Gordon Watson finished four shots further back in second.
With a glut of Northern Order of Merit competitions taking place in August – there are nine between the 7th and the 29th – and national and international events starting to become more infrequent, Brooks plans to play more NOM competitions but does have to make up 51 points on overall leader Christopher Parkinson (Penwortham).
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“I’ve only been able to play in three so far but there are few coming up I can make and hopefully I can close the gap,” said The Mere-based player.
“And it was nice to win again. I was leading at Pleasington but didn’t manage to win and when I played in the Oakdale Acorn last week I was again leading but didn’t come out on top.”
Brooks rattled up eight birdies in his opening round at Crompton and Royton, where tradition dictates that you have to try and make your score on the front nine.
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And the Lancashire county regular was four under through nine before dropping a couple of shots and then recovering them towards the end of his morning round. He birdied two of the last three to post a 66, which was two better than Watson.
In the afternoon he got to three under after eight but a treble bogey on the ninth opened things up for the rest although the Crosby Plate winner held it together well on the back nine and returned a one over 71. Watson could only manage a 73 while Ellesmere’s Matthew Bradshaw shot the best round in the afternoon (70).