The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Forrest bids to keep title in Scottish hands
Scot hopes to follow the lead of Bradley Neil in today’s final
Scotland’s Grant Forrest will attempt to crown an exemplary amateur career with the biggest prize in the unpaid game when he takes on Romain Langasque of France in the Amateur Championship final at Carnoustie.
Forrest, already a winner of the Scottish matchplay titles at men’s and boys’ level, and also the winner of the pre-eminent strokeplay event the St Andrew Links Trophy last year, will aim to join his friend Bradley Neil to become the first Scots to go back-to-back as Amateur champions in 117 years.
As Forrest reached the final on his 22nd birthday, we were only just denied the first all-Scottish Amateur final since as far back as 1909, with Jack McDonald losing in the last four for the second time. The Kilmarnock Barassie player, who lost in the 2012 semi-finals at Royal Troon, went down on the first extra hole after Langasque had holed a dramatic six foot putt to stay alive on the 18th.
“It’s nice to do it on my birthday as I’ve had some pretty bad luck down the years at this event on this day,” said Forrest after he completed wins over compatriot Greig Marchbank and another Frenchman, Alexander Daydou, yesterday.
“I lost last year on my birthday at Portrush, and two years ago my car got run into at Royal Cinque Ports, so maybe I was due something.”
Forrest described his quarter-final with Scotland team mate Greig Marchbank as “the best game I’ve ever had in matchplay in my career”, and it was certainly a close run thing.
Padraig Harrington still talks wistfully about the mistakes he made to lose to Scotland’s Stephen Dundas in the Amateur quarter-finals here in 1992, and even if he gets near the Irishman’s great achievements, one imagines Marchbank will rue his errors on the final holes for just as long.
Forrest always seemed in charge of the match in perfect weather conditions but Marchbank never let him get away and his eagle on 14 and Forrest’s poor second shot at 15 gave the Thornhill player the advantage.
He won 16 to be two up with two to play as Forrest was bunkered off the tee, and had a five-footer at 17 to close it out but misjudged the line, giving his Scotland team-mate new life.
Again on 18 Marchbank had a fourfooter this time to clinch victory, but it was a far from convincing stroke and once against Forrest won with a par to force extra holes.
Marchbank had a longer and trickier chance to finally put victory away on the 19th but missed that as well, and when he drove into a bunker up the left and had to come sideways, those putts came back to bite him.
The wind got up in the afternoon to make play in the semi-final trickier, but Forrest quickly established an advantage against Daydou with three birdies in his first five holes to go two up, and his lead was never worse than that all the way to closing the match out at the 16th.
“If you’d told me when I got back from America two weeks ago that I’d be in the Amateur final I’d have laughed at you, but I’ve found my game back home and there’s no problem with the hip injury that bothered me in April,” he added.
The end of the second semi-final was packed with drama, not least because here again was a Frenchman on the 18th at Carnoustie with the demons of Jean van de Velde as vivid as ever.
Langasque had already visited the Barry Burn on the 17th off the tee to give McDonald a one-up advantage down the last, but after driving wide right – not quite as wildly as his countryman did 16 years ago – he reined in his aggressive nature and didn’t take on the burn again.
“Everyone here talks to me about 1999,” laughed the 20-year-old from Nice, who works with Victor Dubuisson’s coach Benoit Ducoylonbier. “I wasn’t going to do the same as Van de Velde. I had 260 yards to the water and it definitely wasn’t the shot.”
McDonald had 235 yards to the pin and a one up lead, but he opted to lay up as well with the wind against.
He hit in to 10 feet but missed the putt while Langasque holed a six-footer to win the hole and force extra time.
Almost inevitably a par was good enough to win the first extra hole after McDonald missed a 14-footer for a four.