GOLF:JACK HUME, a 17-year-old student at the Darren Clarke Golf School in Antrim, sailed through his two matches in the South of Ireland Championship at Lahinch yesterday in a highly-impressive fashion.
Hume captured the headlines big time in 2010 when he emulated Raymond Burns in winning each of the four provincial boys championships.
A member of Rathsallagh, where he came under the influence of coach Brendan McDaid, the native of Naas has since moved north to the British Open champion’s school in Antrim, which is attended by approximately 40 promising golfers from many parts of the country and where Séamus Duffy is chief coach.
Although this is his first appearance in the South, Hume is already a relatively experienced performer in senior golf and came 14th earlier in the year in the East of Ireland Championship at Baltray.
He admitted last night to being “a little tired”, having travelled to Lahinch directly from representing Leinster in the Boys Interprovincial Championship at Rosses Point, but he has performed so far with the efficiency of a veteran.
He opened with a 73 on Saturday before getting back to even par with a 34 in Sunday’s truncated second round of qualifying.
He duly recorded six birdies in beating Michael Buggy from Castlecomer by 5 and 4 in the first round, before really hitting the high spots when disposing of 2007 West of Ireland champion and former international Joe Lyons by 6 and 5.
Few were more impressed than the loser of the one-sided contest, with Lyons stating that “Jack is as good as I’ve see at that age and he’s a nice fellow as well. He made no mistakes and I just didn’t turn up.”
Hume himself modestly explained that “I holed putts in both matches at the right time and was fairly solid all the way through.”
He demonstrated his maturity by recovering from early arrears to claim three holes in a row, moved four clear with a cracking birdie at the difficult seventh, where he rattled in a putt of 25 feet, and went on to complete the 13 holes without dropping a shot.
Meanwhile, Noel Pyne, at 65 the oldest player in the field and competing in the championship for the 49th time, again demonstrated that age is no barrier when he won his first round against Declan King of Tramore on the 14th, before going down on the same green in the afternoon to a birdie by Richard Bridges of Stackstown.
Kelan McDonagh, the Athlone player who helped Connacht to the Interprovincial Championship last week and was the losing finalist 12 months ago, remains a strong contender, while the youthful Chris Selfridge from Moyola Park stands nicely poised to bring the title north after two good wins yesterday.
