Korean Sung Hoon Kang hung on to win the Australian Amateur Medal at Royal Melbourne yesterday and will now play defending champion, Andrew Martin from Victoria, who snuck in after a play off, in the first round of the match play starting today on the west course at Royal Melbourne.

Kang held a one shot lead over Andrew Tampion (Victoria) after the first 36 holes and extended by a shot after the next 18 holes at Woodlands on Saturday, but Tampion closed the gap with a fine 5 under 67 yesterday to Kang's 68.

Tampion will now play Rudi Bezuidenhout (31st) in the match play section. Rudi is one of nine New South Welshmen who qualified for the match play, the others being Won Joon Lee (3rd), Jamie Arnold (6th), Mitchell Brown (10th), Alex Simpson (13th), Eric Chin (15th), Scott McGuiness (18th), Tristan Lambert (19th) and Dean Van Kampen (28th).

Not even the home growns from Victoria can boast so many players qualifying and hopefully all will make it through to the second round as only two of these nine are playing each other - youngster Eric Chun (Cronulla) will up against seasoned Scott McGuiness from Long Reef.

In other encounters Won Joon Lee would seem to have the stiffest opposition when he takes on Queensland sensation and World Junior Champion Jason Day.

Alex Simpson, who lead after the first round of the medal, and Mitchell Brown, NSW Amateur Champion will both be battling opponents from across the Tasman sea in Jae An and Franz Schwanner respectively, while Tristan Lambert will line up against Taiwanese player Chiang Chen-Chih and Dean Van Kampen will take on the might of the Scots in Eric Ramsay.

Jamie Arnold made amends for his second round 75 at Royal Melbourne by coming home strongly in the last round equalling Tampion's score of 67. He will now meet Jon Abbott from Western Australia.

Source - NSWGA

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