Spanish Amateur delight for English Amateur champion
FORMAT: 36-hole strokeplay / 6-round matchplay
John Gough joined a very select club last night when he became only the second player in history to jointly hold the English and Spanish Amateur titles.
Some supremely-consistent golf saw him defeat Norway’s Michael Mjaaseth 6&5 at Sherry GC yesterday to claim the highly-coveted trophy. Back in August he won the English Amateur at Moortown.
Only Yorkshire’s Danny Willett has previously held both titles at the same time (2007/08) while fellow Tyke Richard Finch is the only other English golfer to have won both but his victories came two years apart (2000/2002).
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Gough joins the likes of Jose Maria Olazabal, Sergio Garcia, Joost Luiten and Romain Langasque on the winners roster and the historic nature of his brilliant performance was not lost on the 23-year-old BB&O player.
“I am pretty honoured to have my name on that trophy,” said Gough, who once again had British Boys champion Jack Bigham on the bag. He also had the support of fellow England players Sam Bairstow, Callan Barrow, Olly Huggins and Harvey Byers during the final.
“When you think only two other players have won both the Spanish and English Amateurs it makes you realise what an achievement it is and it also feels very good in terms of rankings.
“I think I am currently 98 in the world so this will go a long way to helping me achieve my ambition of getting into the top 50 in the world because that would gets me into the American Amateur.”
Gough had been a model of consistency all week and he carried that form into his 36-hole showdown with Mjaaseth. In the morning he went bogey-free and was four up at lunch.
Gough added: “I have gone bogey free a couple of times before but this was the most vital one. I was certainly feeling very good going into my second round.”
The Englishman was three under par for his opening 18 but the Norwegian made a fast start in the afternoon, halving the deficit by the 21st.
However that would be the last hole he would take as his opponent started grinding out the pars his seventh in a row would be enough to win the 27th.
At the very next hole Gough’s lead was back to four as he holed out from 10 feet for his first birdie of the second round and, it went from bad to worse for Mjaaseth, as he hit into the hazard at the 11th (29th) and suddenly he was five down with seven to play.
After the short 12th was halved in threes, both had long birdie chances at the next and Gough’s excellent attempt from 20 feet horse-shoed out while Mjaaseth lagged up to five feet from 45 feet. Unfortunately for the teenager he missed his par putt to hand the title to The Berkshire player, who was then doused in champagne by some of his international team-mates.