NORTHUMBERLAND beat Durham 5-4 in the final match of the under 18s junior county golf season at Tyneside to win the 2007 Northern Junior League Championship, writes Chris Robinson.
Seventeen-year-old Garrick Porteous had a mixed day. In the morning foursomes he partnered Kris Gray (Slaley Hall), who recently won the Chris Robinson Trophy in the Northumberland Junior Strokeplay Championship at Gosforth, and they had a superb 5 a
nd 4 victory over Scott Lambert, from South Moor, who made his senior county debut last weekend, and Jonathan Davey.
In the singles it was nip and tuck all the way, but unfortunately Porteous succumbed on the last green to lose the match 2 down. Overall, he has had an excellent season, becoming an England Boy International and will represent his country in the World Junior Team Championship in Ontario, Canada (September 17-20).
He is one of the youngest to have been selected for the Northumberland senior county team.
No doubt his academic prowess at the King Edward VIth Grammar School in Morpeth will determine his immediate future, but I am sure he would like to emulate Chris Paisley, the 21-year-old Northumberland County Champion, who is on a Golf Scholarship at the University of Tennessee.
l Last week, Robert Dinwiddie from Barnard Castle, after two successive victories on the PGA Challenge Tour, has secured his European Tour Card and will join Ashington's Kenneth Ferrie and former Duham County colleague Graeme Storm from Hartlepool on the main circuit next year.
