Scots ace Johnston on track to top

LIAM Johnston doesn’t hang about. The 25-year-old has made such a rapid rise over the last few months, his thunderous upward trajectory almost appears on the mission control monitors at Cape Canaveral, writes Nick Rodger.

In nine months, he has gone from plying his trade on the thirdtier Pro Golf Tour to all-but securing his card for the main European Tour next season with victory in the Challenge Tour’s Kazakhstan Open on Sunday.

“He has smashed his three-year goals in just a few months,” said his coach, James Erskine.

Over the last couple of years, the Dumfries golfer (below) has developed into a winner. His final season as an amateur in 2017 was burnished by victories in the Africa Amateur Championship and the Scottish Open Strokeplay Championship. At the end of that year, he made the plunge into the paid ranks, won the Pro Golf Tour’s Qualifying School and then won on the circuit at the start of 2018.

In just his third start on the secondtier Challenge Tour, he won again and his latest success at the weekend justified the decision he took a couple of years ago.

“He went to the Q school as an amateur and never got through but he wanted to turn pro,” recalled Erskine.

“I told him, ‘I don’t think you are ready’. I’d never performed on the tour and I didn’t want to give him duff information so I called Andy Coltart. Andy re-iterated what I’d said. Not turning pro then was perhaps one of the best things Liam could’ve done.”