Golf:There must be something in the air as Portstewart's Paul Cutler shot a final 71 to win the prestigious Lytham Trophy just hours before Holywood's Rory McIlroy claimed his first PGA Tour win at the Quail Hollow Championship in North Carolina.
Ireland international Culter was in a three-way tie for the lead alongside Scotland's Kris Nicol and Germany’s Alex Szappanos heading into the final day Royal Lytham and St Anne's in Lancashire.
But Culter’s 71 was good enough to land the title with a 284 winning aggregate, while Nicol finished second and Szappanos joint third alongside England’s Matthew Nixon.
Cutler won last year’s East of Ireland Championship at Baltray where his former Ireland team mate Shane Lowry also won the Irish Open while still an amateur.
Rory McIlroy was runner-up in the Lytham Trophy in 2007 before going on to play Walker Cup and then turn professional. Yesterday, the 20-year-old, who celebrates his 21st tomorrow, became the youngest winner of a PGA Tour event since Tiger Woods’ Disney win in 1996, with a stunning final round 62 at Quail Hollow.