May/June 2024 report

Alan Scovell’s Captain’s Day was held at Purley Downs (Purley Ups and Downs to the less fit amongst us) in early May. A reasonable turnout, no doubt inspired by the prospect of more Fortnum & Mason biscuits amongst the prizes, took to the course on a warm and sunny day – quite a change from the year’s weather to date – and were rewarded by greens in top condition, running true and (very) fast. Views right across London failed to distract the more diligent players, and Don Anderson (right) came out top, for the first time in …. er …. days. His score of 38 points was two ahead of David Absalom in second and three ahead of Alasdair Grievson,  the latter making his first appearance in a society meeting and, by his own admission, more accustomed to being beaten by Ian Chicken in our knockout competition. The biscuits were shared liberally with prizes also handed out for those nearest the pins on the par 3s, and just about anybody else that had turned up.

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The Combined match (the OWs playing alongside the Masters) against the School took place on a very bright Wednesday in May. The school team was a mix of ages (with boys from the Lower 1st through to the VIth form) and handicaps from 1 to 16, very similar as it turned out to those on on the OW and Masters side. So a good match was in prospect. And so it turned out – with a narrow 3-2 win for the OWs/Masters. 

There were some astonishing reports from the course. Tony Harris reports that his schoolboy opponent hit the back of the 204-yard 16th with a 7-iron; his schoolmaster partner hit the 350-yard 9th with a mishit drive; and most impressive of all, OW Harrison Sellers (far left in the group photo) scored an albatross on the par-5 10th hole (468 yards), holing his 60-yard second shot – yes, 60 yards. Do the maths. Harry explained his 400-yard drive by the fact that it caught the downslope – others pointed out that the downslope only starts after about 330 yards. Some feat and (probably!) the first albatross in OWGS history.

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About 115 schools enter the Grafton Morrish; broadly any of the schools affiliated to the Headmasters’ Conference are eligible. To narrow this down to the 48 that can contest the finals at the end of September, regional qualifiers are held. Whitgift falls in the London region for this purpose (curiously, Rugby do as well, while Dulwich contest the South-West!), and qualifying happens each year at Royal Wimbledon GC. This year’s event was on Sunday, May 19th and 14 schools turned up in the hope of winning one of the six berths available for the finals at Hunstanton and Brancaster. It was a brilliantly sunny day.

The qualifier is an 18 hole scratch stableford, for three foursomes pairs. Whitgift’s team (captained by Toby Kemp who was unfortunately injured) was Harry Sellers/Carl Hills; Joe Carmody-Firth/Max Stanley; and Nic Gates/Nick Baxter-Brand. The received wisdom before the event was that 80 points would be enough to qualify, based on previous years’ experience, but the greens were still a little soft after all the rain we have had. Still, Whitgift’s eventual score of 88 points (with the pairs scoring 31, 31 and 26 respectively) looked easily enough, especially when proven-winners Charterhouse, who were Whitgift’s playing partners on the day, only scored . However it was a close-run finish. Eton (winners of the Hewitt in April) scored 97 points, with two of their pairs scoring 38 and 36 (gross 69 and 71 respectively), KCS 90, Epsom and St George’s both 89, WHITGIFT 88, followed by three schools on 87 (Harrow, Rugby and St John’s) only the first of which qualified automatically for the finals (on count back). Phew! Great scoring but a nervy end to the day for many; Charterhouse, Rugby, Westminster, St Paul’s and Highgate being Hewitt schools who missed out. No wonder some maintain that the Morrish is more difficult to win than the Hewitt – and that was just qualifying!

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Another fine day saw the OWs take on the Old Alleynians in the annual ‘South London Derby’ at Tandridge. This is always a friendly and well-supported event on both sides and again, it was 16-a-side, with the OAs fielding a fairly low-handicap side including three of their Hewitt side. Whitgift didn’t field any, and had only three players with single-figure handicaps, against seven from the OAs. So the OWs generally were in receipt of shots, and not giving them!

There was some good golf played, especially by the society’s captain for the day, Jeremy Stanyard and his partner Kevin Powell, who played comfortably better than his handicap. Stanyard & Powell prevailed 5&4 and were back in the clubhouse before anyone else. The OAs Jonnie Waugh drove the green on Tandridge’s 16th and furthermore found the back tier where the flag was. This was a very close match which the OAs eventually won on the 18th. Another OA, Hugo Avshu took the prize for the longest drive on the par-5 9th hole, leaving himself only a pitching wedge to the green; however he could only halve the hole with Alan Scovell. Alan and partner Roger Oldfield (the grateful recipient of two shots on some of the holes!) eventually won this match 2&1. Overall, the OWs emerged triumphant by 5 matches to 2, with one halved.

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Every year, Royal Wimbledon host a schools’ putting competition, now named the Gordon Thorburn Schools Putting Competition. Whitgift have only just been allowed back into the competition, having been relegated last time out. Each school team has four players, who play individually against their opposite numbers in seven other schools. There are four qualifying evenings and the leading two schools from each evening go through to a final in the following week . The bottom two teams in each group are relegated.

In this year’s event, Whitgift were represented by Matt Webster, Nic Gates, Richard Gibson, and Chris Blundell (an RWGC member). The team finished in fourth place out of eight, and the individual results are shown below.

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