BOY GOLF FINALIST.

Taranaki Daily News, 3 January 1920, Page 10

BOY GOLF FINALIST.

SUCCESS IN AMERICA. WONDERFUL COOLNESS SHOWN. Fortune decreed that the two most interesting figures left in the penultimate stage of the American National Amateur Golf Championship, "Bobby" Jones, the 17-year-okl Atlanta boy, and W. C. Fownes, winner of the championship in 1910, should r.:eet on the Oakmont Country Club's course, Pennsylvania, and the result was the ousting of the adult player and the passing of the boy competitor into the final, writes a correspondent from Pittsburg. Each of the two matches was over 35 holes, and right from the start the precocity of Jones was in evidence, as lie not only proceeded to hold his elder rival but during the first round took the lead more than onee.

For a youngster he got a prodigious length through the green, his wooden club play particularly comparing favorably with that of Fownes, while his putting was, if anything, superior to that of the former championship holder. It was noticeable that Fownes never .seemed to be comfortable, while the position was not improved for him by the fact that the sympathies of the immense crowd were only too obviously with the boy.

However, Jones did not allow this to influence him in the least, and the steadiness of his game in varying circumstances was worthy of a player many years his senior, and several times after losing his lead he drove from the next tee with the utmost truth and straightness. There was a great scene on the thirtythird green, at which stage Jones wus as cool as if practising on a putting course. He had gone to the right with his brassie, but with wonderful sangfroid he proceeded to get on the green with his next essay.

Afterwards he was left with a four-foot putt to qualify him for the final. He really did not give it v.ndue study, but nevertheless he struck the ball 'firmly and truly. His ball caught a slight hillock on its passage to the hole,'and it looked at one time as if the match would have to be carried to the next green. However, the ball just managed to get the lip of the hole, and it swerved round to the back of the tin. It seemed to hover there for just a fraction of a second—the while Jones calmly watched its doings—and a great roar of enthusiasm went up as it rolled into the hols