Marshall tops order of merit

Will Marshall capped a stellar season by topping the Durham County Order of Merit.

Heworth-based Will clinched the title with seven top 10 finishes in the 11 events this season, amassing 700 points and holding off a late charge up the rankings by Seaton Carew’s Cameron Wallace.

Cameron’s late charge included a superb four under-par score in gale-force winds to win the Dinsdale Tankard along with a third place finish at the Northern Golf Masters at Rockliffe Hall, the final event of the season. Those results took his order of merit total to 575 – enough to edge out Brancepeth’s Richard Aisbitt, who’d won the Leonard Crawley Medal and Bishop Auckland Bowl earlier this season.

Tied with Aisbitt on 550 points was Chester-le-Street’s Kevin Suggest while Eaglescliffe’s Tom Smith totalled 495 for fourth place and Martin McCririck (South Shields) finished on 455 points in fifth place.

In the Dinsdale Tankard, Cameron finished six shots clear of Darlington’s Adam Bates with Tom Smith (Eaglescliffe) third.

Meanwhile, Will’s consistency was not to be denied. He won the Keith Shivers Bowl in a playoff with Jason McGuire at Heworth and was rarely out of the points in this year’s events.

At Boldon’s re-arranged scratch open, sponsored by Euroserve, Stuart Brown’s rounds of 71 and 70 saw him win by five from James Gerencser (72-74) with Alasdair Baird, Gavin Nesbit, Martin McCririck and Kevin Suggett all posting 36-hole totals of 148.

The Northern Golf Masters, played over one round at Rockliffe Hall, was won by Whitley Bay’s Daniel Beeson with 72. Richard Aisbitt and Cameron Wallace missed out on countback as John Kirkpatrick finished fourth on 73.