Dorset County

Our first South East League match of the season took us to Brokenhurst Manor to play Hampshire. Hampshire had two players away on England duty, so hopes of a result were high. A new pairing of Robbie Mabb and Matt Hector led us off but they were soon behind despite making a birdie at the first. Our other pairs also struggled early on, the top two matches both losing 2&1 despite making brief comebacks. Norton and Barnes lost 3&2 at the back, and things got worse when Legg and Welch lost the 17th to go 1 down. We escaped a foursomes whitewash when a beautiful pitch to 5 feet from Jon Welch was converted by Giles Legg to secure a half. The morning score of 3 ½ - ½ was going to be very difficult to come back from, but things soon looked very good with Dorset being up in five matches at the turn, and very close in the other three. The Hampshire Captain, Alan Mew, looked very worried. Things then turned on their head with Dave Cook losing on the last after having had a good lead and Matt Hector left cursing his putting after a 1 down loss to Martin Young. All the other matches had positive results with wins for Norton, Mabb and Welch and halves for Leech, Legg and Barnes. This left us agonisingly short of the 5 ½ points needed for a halved match. A valiant effort from the team in the afternoon singles, but we need to get more out of our foursome matches to be able to compete in the league. Giles Legg (Captain)