After the biblical-tough conditions on day one of the Connolly Motor Group West of Ireland Championship at County Sligo Golf Club, the weather gods didn’t so much smile on the field as offer a slight reprieve, but scoring was much improved.
Dun Laoghaire’s Robert Abernethy carded the low round of the day and it was enough to take leading qualifier honours by a one-stroke margin over Castleknock’s Quentin Carew and Dwayne Mallon of Dungannon.
Playing in the third-to-last group, 25-year-old Abernethy made back-to-back birdies on five and six, and added another on nine to make the turn at -3 for the day and +2 overall. A dropped shot via a three-putt on 10 was quickly recovered on 11, and he remained the hottest player on the course just as the temperatures dropped, the wind picked up and the drizzling rain turned icy.
But Abernethy remained a man in control, carding seven straight pars to finish, including a neat up-and-down from short right on the par-3 16th.
He now takes the number one seed as the event moves to matchplay, with the cutline falling at +14.
“I’m delighted with that now,” Abernethy said after confirming his position at the top of the board and securing the Pat Ruddy Cup for leading qualifier. “Happy to come in, played very solidly today, obviously after yesterday, it was a little bit easier conditions today, but still tough. Got a bit of rain for the last few holes, but delighted now.”
The 17th hole was playing brutally tough and the additional wind and rain the final groupings faced upped the ante even further, but a rifled 2-iron saw him find the dancefloor and clean up with two putts. That was the real clinching moment, even though he still had to par the last.
“Yeah, the rain was properly [coming] down on 17, so I was happy to see the 2-iron stay up on top of the hill, not roll back,” he recalled. “Then happy with the two-putt as the greens got a bit trickier as they got wetter.”
Mallon had been in the first group to take to the course on day two, and he shot a round of level-par to go with his opening three-over 74 and set the first clubhouse target, but Carew, who birdied each of his opening three holes and then eagled the fifth after a bogey on four, had looked poised to set the bar higher before dropped shots on 16 and 17 saw him fall back.
Still, he felt his round of 75 the previous day might just have trumped the 70 he shot on day two.
“I think yesterday’s really because it was just so difficult yesterday,” he said when asked which was the better score, “but today I got off to a great start with three birdies in a row and that kind of settled things down then because you’ve a bit more comfort in the round.”
Carew takes the number-two seed into matchplay, edging Mallon on countback, but nobody knows better than the former Irish Close champion that just being in the 64 can be enough.
“I learned that myself,” he said, referencing that Close victory where he came in as the 64th-ranked player and went on to lift the title, “it doesn’t matter. Once you get in, you’re in, it’s a fresh start again tomorrow morning.”
Other big names to make it through include Jake Whelan, Luke O’Neill and first-round leader Simon Walker who shared seventh at +6, local favourite Aodhagan Brady, David Reddan and 53-year-old former finalist Eddie McCormack on +7, defending champion Keith Egan on +8, Colm Campbell on +11, pre-tournament favourite Stuart Grehan on +12, and a pair of former North of Ireland winners in James Fox and Seán Flanagan, the latter having topped Wednesday’s pre-qualifier.
Another local in TJ Ford and 2024 Bridgestone Order of Merit champion Brian Doran were among the biggest casualties, both missing out by the minimum on +15.
One of the day’s highlights belonged to PGA National Slieve Russell’s Seamus Cullen, who along with carding a one-over 72 for an eight-over tally that leaves him comfortably in the knockout stages, made a hole-in-one on the fourth.
“Ben [Hanratty] was up before me and I was between two clubs but he came up a little short so I decided to go with 7-iron. It started on line and didn’t move, so I thought ‘that’s good enough’, then Eddie [McCormack] started jumping.”
Some mouthwatering ties now await in the round of 64, and Abernethy will face Greg O’Mahony of Fota Island in the lead out match, and arguably the most intriguing encounter will be that of Stuart Grehan and Eddie McCormack who tee off at 9.42 am.
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