Class of '99 gets together

Ireland's conveyer belt of new golfing talent knows no bounds, and the new generation will undergo their first coaching session of the "winter" season at the MacGregor Academy in CityWest, near Saggart, next weekend.

Indeed, an indication of the turnover in the new 16-player boys' squad is that there are just three survivors - Sean McTernan (Co Sligo), Mervyn Owens (Mallow) and Mark O'Sullivan (Galway) - from this season's squad which lifted the European Boys' championship in Gullane last July, Ireland's first time to win the title.

All the members of that historic winning team were guests of The K Club last weekend, and nonplaying-captain Jimmy Greene believes the Golfing Union of Ireland have finally got it right with their structured approach to coaching. "The results speak for themselves. We won the Boys' Home Internationals last year for the first time in the first year of the new set-up and this year we won the European Boys' championship and the European Youths' nations cup," he said.

"Our objective is to provide everything that is attainable. There was a time when young players felt the only route to take was a scholarship to a college in the United States, but we are providing a worthy alternative to that route," added Greene.

The GUI Boys' Panel for 1998/'99 is: Sean McTernan (Co Sligo), Mark O'Sullivan (Galway), Mervyn Owens (Mallow), Daire Loughnane (Galway), Derek McNamara (Connemara), Marc Kynes (Old Conna), Paul McDonald (Old Conna), Enda McLoughlin (Tullamore), Michael Canty (Tramore), Paul McNamara (Youghal), Martin Poucher (Limerick), Darren Crowe (Dunmurry), Conor Doran (Banbridge), James McCracken (Malone), Ian Stafford (Bandon), Mark Rowe (Athlone).