Gleeson ends O’Keeffe’s Irish Amateur Close hopes

By Brian Keogh and Jay Bayford

Castle’s Alex Gleeson ended Peter O’Keeffe’s AIG Irish Amateur Close dreams when he got up and down for par on the 18th and the Douglas man three-putted to crash out in the quarter-finals at The European Club.

A beaten finalist at Tramore in 2015 before winning at Ballyiffin two years ago, Gleeson will meet Balbriggan veteran Robbie Cannon in today’s semi-finals with Killiney’s Eoin Leonard seeing off Marc McCormack at the 19th to earn a showdown with Portmarnock international Conor Purcell in the other.

“I felt I had a lot of chances to take control of the game and Peter will feel the same,” said Gleeson, who made an 18-foot birdie putt at the last to beat Hermitage’s Rowan Lester by one hole in the third round

We both made mistakes and left the door open for the other person. I was lucky at the end that the ball stayed up but then I made a lovely up and down.

He faces a tough semi-final against 39-year old former Irish Amateur Open and South of Ireland champion Cannon, who holed a sand wedge from 105 yards for an eagle two at the first, then birdied the second, third, seventh and 10th to set up a 7&6 win over Rosslare’s Gary Collins in the morning before beating Castleknock’s Dylan Brophy 4&2 in the afternoon.

With two of the six amateur “majors” on his CV, Cannon wants to add the “Close” to his resumé and move halfway to towards the “Grand Slam”.

Purcell (21) reached the semi-finals of the British Amateur earlier this summer but he had to go to the 20th to beat Mallow’s James Sugrue in the third round before easing to a 4&2 win over Laytown and Bettystown’s Eugene Smith. He will face another 21-year-old in Killiney’s Eoin Leonard, who beat Dungarvan’s Kevin Stack 6&5 before coming back from three down after eight to beat American Marc McCormack on the 19th.

Meanwhile Ireland will go up against Scotland in the Boys’ Home Internationals looking to build on their 10-5 victory over Wales yesterday at Royal Dornoch in Scotland.

Mark Power (Kilkenny) and Aaron Marshall (Lisburn) made the perfect start with a 3&2 victory over Archie Davies and James Ashfield in the foursomes while John Brady (Rosslare) and Tom McKibbin (Holywood) doubled Ireland’s advantage.

Wales got back into the game as Eoin Murphy (Dundalk) and Max Kennedy (Royal Dublin) were beaten 5&4 by Connor Owen and Reuben Bather but Athenry duo Allan Hill and David Kitt got Ireland back to winning ways before Luke O’Neill (Connemara) and Odhran Maguire (Slieve Russell) rounded off the foursomes in style.

In the singles Power beat Ben Davies 5&3 but McKibbin and Marshall lost to Archie Davies and Matthews before Brady halved with Ashfield to keep Ireland 5.5-3.5 ahead.

Big wins for Charlie Denvir (Elm Park) and Murphy put Ireland on the cusp of victory before Kennedy edged past Matthew Sandoz by one hole to seal the result. O’Neill added more points with a 5&4 win over Bather. Hill halved his match with Abe Forsyth. Tom Peet restored some pride for Wales with a win over Kitt.

Scotland suffered a 10-5 defeat to England.