No. 45 Captain: Kevin Roberts. March 2004
"Captain Lucky" Lives Up To His Nickname.
After a week of gale-force winds and driving rain – during which a near century-old plane tree came crashing to the ground on the fifth hole – conditions were dry and calm when Captain Kevin Roberts, who has said he hopes to be as lucky with the weather as his two immediate predecessors, drove-in the new season on March 27.
As befits a four-handicapper his ball soared straight and true down the first fairway.
Competition among the 144 competitors was extremely tight with no fewer than four pairs scoring 44 Stableford points.
After a countback, Brian Donnelly and Lee Rowbotham (emerging from his winter hibernation), were declared the winners, with last year’s captain, Alf Selby and Steve McNamara in second place.
The unlucky non-prizewinners were Adrian Buckley and Alan Rothera, followed by John Suttie and Nigel Wareing.
Selby and McNamara also took the honours in the simultaneous competition restricted to council members and guests, with Peter Griffin and Alan Garner (43 points), in second place.
Winter League Final - Heroic Four Defeat Gale.
Noel Brown (12) and Paul Higgins (16) defeated Dave Whaley (12) and Mark Lord (27) in the final of the winter league, but all four players deserved a medal for battling against the winds gusting to 58mph which brought down the historic tree on the fifth.
Said Higgins: "We were extremely lucky because we had been standing under the tree just before it blew over."
Brown and Higgins got off to a whirlwind start and were three up after five, and four up with four to play.
Whaley raised their opponents’ hopes by winning the 15th and 16th holes, and things looked even more hopeful when Higgins’ drive from the 17th tee found the bunker on 15, with Brown also in trouble.
But Higgins chipped out of the sand onto the 14th fairway, and his hole-out in five was enough to settle the match for the heroic quartet.
Equally heroic were the competitors in a Pro’s comp. on the same day, many of whom were also soaked to the skin when the weather was at its worst.
The winner was Steve Beeney with 34pts. Runner up was Geoff Dawson, two points adrift.
Snooker Final. By The Left – It’s Dawson.
Geoff Dawson, who plays golf right-handed but plays snooker left-handed, won the annual snooker championship with a straight two-frame defeat of defending champion Graham Wilson.
Receiving four blacks (28pts) per frame from his scratch opponent, Dawson set out with a "what I have I hold" strategy, playing safety snooker from the outset.
Wilson twice gave away shots in the early stages and trailed by 47-8 before getting into his stride to pull the score back to 56-58, including a break of 25.
Dawson then missed a pink which would have given him the frame, but redeemed himself on his next visit to the table to win by 64-56.
Both players were extremely cagey in the early stages of the second frame.
Wilson was unlucky to see a red jump out a middle pocket with the black available and Dawson cashed in with a break of 15 to take him into a 44-3 lead.
Again Wilson fought back with a 21 break but his luck ran out when Dawson fluked a yellow into the top right when playing a safety shot and took the green, brown, and blue in his next two visits to lead 69-35.
He left the pink over the top right pocket but Wilson, facing an impossible task, brought the match to a conclusion by potting the ball.
Receiving the Albert Brooks Cup, Dawson paid tribute to his rival and admitted that he had benefitted from two byes earlier in the championship.
Anyone Recognise This Old Medal?
As a youngster, Oldham cabbie Stuart Whittaker was a keen collector of medals.
About fifty years ago one of his distant relatives gave him the one pictured here, which he has recently passed on to Tom Rowbotham.
It is brass-coloured and has the letters W.G.C. embossed on it in green letters. In the middle are crossed golf clubs and three balls, and it has a pin on the back which suggests it might have been for a lady.
It is somewhere between a 10p piece and a 20p piece in size.
Anybody got any idea of its history?
Death Of Ex-secretary.
Former Secretary Ivor West, a Scarborough newsagent, has died at the age of 61.
A keen ballroom dancer and pilot, he was at the controls in 1983 when Tom McNamara took an aerial photograph of the course, which now hangs under the pictures of our two captains in the lounge.
Peter Heywood, who had to give up his club membership when diagnosed with cancer, has also passed away after a long battle against the disease.
Brierley Wins Monthly Medal.
Adrian Brierley won the March monthly medal with a score of 71-9-62 on a card play-off from 12-handicapper Noel Brown.
Brierley is also the club’s handicap secretary and will no doubt be having a word with himself soon.
The second division was won by Steve Walton (82-17-64) on a countback from Geoff Hibbert, who plays off twenty.A Pro’s comp. was won by Joe Cassidy with 40 Stableford points, again on a CPO from John Martin, who edged out Curt Helme for second place.
Fine Victory In M.O.S. Classic.
Werneth scored a fine away victory over Crompton and Royton by two and a half matches to one and a half in the latest round of the Mail on Sunday National Golf Classic.
Peter Griffin and Mark Abbott both won their matches on the 18th, but the Captain went down by two and one.
Lee Rowbotham was our last man out and was one down at the 17th.
At the last, he escaped from a bunker to hit the green and sank his putt, while his opponent three putted to enable Lee to snatch a vital half.
It’s President Kingham.
Congratulations to Albert Kingham, who was elected president of the Oldham and District Past Captains Association at the recent annual meeting.
Tree Fund To Be Launched.
Due to the prohitive cost of buying a mature tree to replace the one blown down in the recent gale, the council is to launch a tree fund to which members are invited to subscribe.
The plan is to plant a large silver birch at the same spot with a small copse alongside to maintain the difficulty of the fifth hole and to protect players on the sixth tee.
Ladies.
Captain Jane Drives In.
Lady Captain Jane Clark got off to a good start after driving in the section’s new season by leading her team to victory over the Lady Secretary’s team in the traditional fixture.
The Spring meeting was won by Fiona Dooley and Sheila Waterhouse with a net 58. Sheila also won a 2-ball Stableford with 37pts.
The section’s Psychic Evening was a great success, raising £581.