Brian McElhinney kept his Walker Cup bid on track as he survived a stern test in his opening matchplay round of the British Amateur championship at Royal Birkdale yesterday.
The 22-year-old from Donegal, the reigning Irish champion and order of merit winner, edged to a narrow one-hole victory in an evenly-contested tussle with Italian Edoardo Molinari.
McElhinney visited the Chicago Golf Club - venue for this season's Walker Cup - with the British and Irish elite squad last year, but the former European champion knows he needs a good run on the Lancashire coast this week to enhance his chances of making a return visit to the Windy City in August.
"I've not done anything at all in the main events this year," said McElhinney, who birdied 14 and 17 to turn a one-hole deficit against Molinari into a crucial one-hole lead. "I missed the cut at both the Lytham and St Andrews Links Trophies and I know I need to have a good week here to have a chance. I maybe might need to win it, I don't know. I'm pleased with this start."
McElhinney will now face a third-round joust with fellow Irishman Mervyn Owens of Mallow, who battled to a 19th hole win over Carnoustie's Keir McNicoll.
Dunmurry's Darren Crowe powered to an impressive 5 and 4 triumph in the all-Irish clash with North West's Michael McGeady.
The 24-year-old, runner-up in the Irish Open strokeplay championship recently, never looked back after forging into a three-hole lead after seven as he set up a third-round tie with Kevin Moore.
County Sligo's Seán McTernan fell 3 and 2 to Woburn's Steve Lewton while Banbridge's Richard Kilpatrick, the sixth Irishman to survive Tuesday's qualifying cut, also made a swift exit as he succumbed 2 and 1 to Robert Leonard of Hertfordshire.
Elsewhere, Nigel Edwards, the Welsh Walker Cup stalwart, took a swing at golf's slow coaches after battling through his opening round. The 36-year-old, who holed the winning putt in the 2003 Walker Cup, beat Wentworth's Jonathan Evans at the 19th hole but was left fuming after his tie took a desperate four hours to complete. "I'm glad for the championship that I won," said Edwards. "The pace of play was ridiculous. "Four hours for a two-ball is too long. The guy I was playing took three minutes to play one shot. He's known for slow play and we've had to get on his back about it before.
"The majority of us want to just play but this type of thing has a knock-on effect and it's spoiling it for the rest. It's irritating but what can I do? It's not the officials, it's the players that are the ones to blame."
Forfar's Stuart Wilson, the reigning British Amateur champion, was the chief casualty after losing 5 and 4 to Wales' James Williams.