Hopkins sets pace with battling display

SUCH are the twists and turns of life that unheralded Skerries teenager Jeff Hopkins could easily be playing at centre half for the likes of Liverpool or Blackburn Rovers. Instead, a series of chronic injuries ended his dreams of a professional soccer career when he was just 14 years old.

Yesterday, on a typically windy Royal Dublin day, the 17-year-old Dubliner proved that soccer’s loss was golf’s gain as he posted the only sub-par score of the day to take a one stroke lead in the first round of the AIB Irish Amateur Open.

A one-under par 71 would not normally raise eyebrows but a stiff northwest wind, gusting over 20mph flummoxed the 120-strong international field to such an extent that the CSS for the day was 78 with scores soaring as high as 92.