Niall Kearney’s closing, level-par 72 was enough to see the Dubliner safely through the first examination of the DP World Tour’s three-part qualification series at France’s Golf du Moliets, though Stuart Grehan, Tim Rice, Michael Young and Stephen Grant all miss out.
Starting the day on -8, and three shots inside the provisional top-20 mark, Kearney, who played a near full 2022 season on the European Tour, as it was then called, knew that he’d be unlikely to fall out of the qualification spots with a round of level-par or better, but with no birdies and two bogeys in his opening 13 holes, was on shaky ground.
He’d play the final five in two-under thanks to birdies at 14 and 16, and ended the week tied for 11th at -8, which saw him comfortably advance with a shot to spare.
Grehan can take minor consolation in the knowledge that his closing bogey wasn’t the decisive factor in him missing the grade as his final score left him three strokes shy of the mark.
Rice, who finished birdie-birdie, joined him on that number, and Young, who’d started on the back nine, saw his chances go by the wayside as he’d go bogey, double-bogey, bogey on holes two, three and four, and eventually finish at level-par, one stroke ahead of Birr amateur Stephen Grant.
In total, four of the 20 qualifiers still have amateur status, with Welshman Matt Roberts joining a French trio, and they’ll all make their way to Spain in the first week of November for Second Stage Qualifying, with the third and final stage set to be held at Infinitum, just south of Barcelona, a week later.
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