Danny Lee wins NZ Amateur title
IN: News | New Zealand Mens Amateur | New Zealand Amateur Championship (2007) | by Bruce Young : iseekgolf.com | 22 Apr 2007
Walter Godfrey wrote his name into New Zealand golf history in 1958 when, at the age of 16 years, he became the youngest amateur to win the national match-play championship at the St Andrews course in Hamilton.
Co-incidentally it was the at the same venue that a second 16-year-old won the country’s premier individual title, Danny Lee emulating Godfrey’s feat by beating Nick Gillespie, 7 and 5, at the Hamilton Golf Club today.
It was not a classic final, Gillespie being the first to admit his confidence with the driver was down and he was standing on the tee with no idea of where his drive was going. When it finished at the 31st hole, Lee was one-under and Gillespie seven-over.
After 18 holes, Lee was five up, and the result almost a foregone conclusion even with the afternoon round to come. A birdie at the first in the second round gave Gillespie a glimmer of hope, but that died when his drive at the next rested against a tree and he took a penalty drop and lost the hole with a double bogey.
“I was behind the eight-ball at lunch because you can’t give a player of the quality of Danny Lee a five-hole start and that drive on the second about summed it up.”
The win by Lee confirmed that he and James Gill (Hamilton), winner of the New Zealand 72-hole stroke-play championship on Thursday, are clearly the country’s best two amateurs.
It has been a stellar year already for Lee who has won the New Zealand under 23 championship in Hastings, the South Island 72-hole stroke-play championship at Shirley and his two singles when New Zealand beat Australia in the Sloan Morpeth international at Royal Canberra recently.
Lee said that the match play title meant more to him than the stroke-play. “I tried to shoot low in the stroke rounds but it didn’t happen (he tied for 12th on one-under par 287), but I cared most about the match play – I think that is the most important.”
Lee has set the world Eisenhower Trophy team tournament in Adelaide as his next major mission and to that means he is heading to Korea in a fortnight to tee up in the Maekyung professional event, a tournament his namesake, Eddie Lee from Canterbury, won some years back.
He has missed the cut in his two professional starts to date – the Australian Open and New Zealand Open.
To win the title, Lee eliminated 2006 Australian match-play champion, Tim Stewart, top Victorian, Tom Prowse, North Island and South Island runner-up Jared Pender, and Gill before disposing of 19-year-old Gillespie with a solid rather than spectacular display.
Gillespie, son of former New Zealand cricketer, Stu Gillespie, said he was “stoked” to make the final in only second appearance at the championship.
But after 12 rounds in eight days he said he was “knackered” and his game reflected that.
Source – NZGA
