For the third year in succession we came up against neighbours Tulfarris in the Barton Cup. Having been beaten by them in the pre-season Garden County trophy match, Paddy Brady’s team knew they would be up against a good team.
Tony McGinley got proceedings underway in Blessington Lakes with a drive down the middle but they soon found themselves in trouble early in as they went 3 down through 6 holes. However they sparked back into life with 5 wins in a row from the 8th to put themselves right back into contention and eventually got to 3 up with 3 to play. You would think it would be a formality to finish off the match form here but Tulfarris showed great determination and won the 16th, 17th and 18th to bring the match to tie holes. Tony’s drive found trouble on the right hand side of the 19th but playing partner Jerry Bergin played a miraculous shot to find the green and a two putt par was good enough to seal the win.
Meanwhile the other home pairing Diarmuid McCarthy and Brendan Flynn cruised to victory with a solid performance and won their match 6 & 5. Now with 2 wins in the bag all eyes focused on the 3 games in Tulfarris where we needed to win one to take the overall result.
Tulfarris dominated the first half of proceedings by the fact than no Blessington Lakes pairings managed to get ahead in their match until Ben Cullen & Paddy Carthy parred the 12th to go 1 up. They never looked back and proceeded to win the 13th, 14th and 15th to take a well deserved 4 & 3 victory which sealed the overall victory on the day.
Lee McMillan and Christy Murray fought hard in there match but were ultimately outclassed by their opponents and finished early. The final pairing of Philip Wardick and Paul McGee played a very close match and were all square standing on the 15th fairway when they were called in.
This means we progress to the 2nd round of the Barton Cup and have beaten the neighbours 3 years in a row in this competition. We will face either Rathsallagh or Mount Wolsely in the 2nd round.
The rain pours down on the 3rd hole at Tulfarris
(match commentary was broadcast live over the Blessington Lakes twitter feed)