A sublime bogey-free three-under-par round of 70 saw Knock’s Katie Poots take sole possession of the lead and claim leading qualifier honours at the AIG Irish Women’s and Girl’s Close Championship at Enniscrone.
Birdies on the par-5 fourth, par-4 ninth and par-5 14th holes along with 15 pars gave her a two-under-par overall tally and a one-stroke advantage over Romford’s Zoe McLean-Tattan who birdied three of her final nine holes in a two-under 71 to take the number-two seed.
Rebekah Gardner of Clandeboye, Ballinrobe’s Shannon Burke, and Anna Dawson of Tramore all finished one shot further adrift at level-par, and they are seeded three-to-five respectively via countback.
Hannah Lee-McNamara, Ella Cantwell and Emma O’Driscoll round out the top eight, with O’Driscoll set to face ninth-seeded Anna Abom in arguably the tie of the round of 16, though Aideen Walsh squaring off against Cantwell is another strong contender. Molly O’Hara, Eva Branks, Isabella Stewart, Kayleigh Mulholland, Caitlin Shippam and Ella-Louise McCorry took places 11 through 16 respectively, and McCorry has the unenviable task of facing Poots in the lead-out match at 08:00.
Douglas’ Claudia O’Donoghue missed out on qualification for the Women’s Championship matchplay by two strokes, but she’ll take the number-one seed into the Irish Girl’s Plate round of 16.
FULL SCORING AND MATCHPLAY DRAWS
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