Ulster duo are hoping to earn final chapter at Royal Portrush
MATT McClean (Malone) and Adam Mulhall (Ardglass) lead Ulster’s hopes of North of Ireland Amateur Championship success at Royal Portrush today.
McClean will face Ian Lynch (Rosslare) in the semi-finals this morning, while Mulhall lines up against English visitor Kieran Babbage (The Players Club).
This is new territory for McClean, who reached the last-16 in 2014 before losing to eventual winner Chris Selfridge.
“I felt happy enough today. Surprisingly, I had minimal nerves,” said the 25-year-old optometrist, who beat Barry Cashman (Belvoir Park) in the quarter-finals yesterday afternoon.
“Overall today I made a lot of good pars but missed some birdie chances. I didn’t miss a huge amount of greens and that will be hard to beat if you can do that for hopefully two rounds tomorrow.”
Mulhall will become a trainee professional at Ardglass GC in October and would love to bow out of amateur golf with a win.
“It’s a bit of a surprise to get this far,” said the 22-year-old who recently graduated from Stirling University with a degree in Sports Science.
“I knew I was capable but it was just a matter of putting it all together.”
Meanwhile, Ulster were crowned Women’s Inter-pro champions following a 5-3 win over Leinster at Castle Dargan.
Elsewhere, Graeme McDowell’s chances of securing a late place at The Open look slim after the first round of the Scottish Open at Gullane.
McDowell, who shot a one-under 69, needs to finish as one of the top three players not already qualified for Carnoustie, with Scott Fernandez currently in that third spot sitting at six-under.
HARRY Kane insists England’s World Cup exit marks the beginning of an exciting future, and not the end for the team. The striker admitted the squad is hurting badly from the semi-final defeat to Croatia, but believes it is the start of something special.
Juventus striker Mario Mandzukic scored in extra-time in Moscow on Wednesday night to make the score 2-1 and shatter their dreams.
But Kane says that when the disappointment eases, England can look back on their journey in Russia with pride.
“Of course we’re gutted. It’s hard to put it into words now,” the 24-year-old said. “All we can say is we’re proud of each other — we gave it everything.
“I know we’re going to look back and think we could have done this and that, but it was small margins in a big game and it just didn’t go our way.”
England arrived in Russia with one of the tournament’s youngest and most inexperienced sides, and on the back of humiliating exits at the 2014 World Cup and Euro 2016.
But they defied expectations to reach the last-four, with players such as Kane, Harry Maguire and Kieran Trippier coming of age.
And Kane, the tournament’s top scorer with six goals, believes it is merely the start of an exciting journey for a young England side.
“When you look at our team and how young it is, the gaffer has only been in charge for a couple of years,” he said.
“It’s massive — it’s massive that we had a good tournament, restored the pride in the nation and the fans were excited to watch us play.
“That’s how we’ve got to keep it — we’ve got to keep progress- I know we’ll get better and we just have to learn from nights like this.”
England, playing in their first World Cup semi-final since 1990, took a fifth-minute lead via Trippier’s free-kick.
But Croatia came back strongly in the second half, levelling through Ivan Perisic.
His stabbed finish took the tie into extra-time, with Mandzukic scoring the winner in the 109th minute.
Kane added: “We had a good spell, we went 1-0 up and had a couple of chances where we could have got the second.
“In the second half Croatia came out, put the pressure on and we were under the cosh for a little while. We handled it well, but unfortunately we conceded at the wrong time.
“It was small margins — in extra-time we had a corner cleared off the line. These are the things you need to go your way in a big game, and unfortunately they didn’t go our way.”
Afterwards, England boss Gareth Southgate — part of the side that lost the Euro ’96 semi-final to Germany — comforted the players.
Kane said Southgate had urged them to hold their heads high.
He added: “The gaffer spoke and said we should all be proud of ourselves — of course nothing he’s going to say is going to make us feel any better.
“He told us to be proud, to hold our heads up high, because we’ve come a long way — especially from two years ago.
“Even to hear the fans singing out there, after the defeat, is a proud feeling, and all we can do is try and build on it.
“We’ve built a good foundation over the last couple of years with the manager and support and that, and we’ll carry that on.
“We’ve shown that we can do