Greenwood Cup 2019
The final weekend of the Greenwood Cup was played @ Hawkes Bay Golf Club over the weekend under Hawkes Bays finest weather. With a little bit of wind to contend with it made for some great golf.
The Saturday morning rounds saw some very interesting results with Onga Onga remaining unbeaten and Napier losing their 1st Match. This left it all to play for with Hastings, Hawkes Bay, Napier & Maraenui all 1 win behind Onga Onga with 3 rounds remaining.
Some very interesting afternoon results added to those from the morning. Napier with a very close fought victory over defending champions Hastings and Maraenui defeating the only undefeated team Onga Onga leaving it wide open.
This left the 4 teams of Hawkes Bay, Maraenui, Napier & Onga Onga all on 4 wins out of 5 with Maraenui leading the pack by only .5 points from Napier. Hastings were now sitting a further place back losing their 2nd match against Napier in the afternoon.
It all came down to the last day with any number of teams able to claim victory with Napier, Maraenui, Onga Onga, Hawkes Bay & Hastings all in with a mathematical chance to win the Greenwood Cup for 2019.
The state of play changed dramatically on a fine Sunday morning with Hastings beating Onga Onga and Maraenui beating Napier. This left the morning match of Hawkes Bay vs Central Hawkes Bay crucial if Hawkes Bay won it could still come down to match score in the afternoon. Central Hawkes Bay came up with arguably the win of the weekend with a 6-4 win.
This after some intense calculations made it come down to a 2 horse race with the afternoon match of Maraenui vs Hastings determining the winner for 2019.
Maraenui needed a minimum of 5 matches to take victory with a half being good enough to take the cup. However if Hastings won it came back to a 4 way tie and a countback on the overall teams match scores.
In a very tight battle fought all the way to the last hole in the afternoon the defending champions of Hastings were able to win by the narrowest of Margins 5.5-4.5.
This meant that it came down the the total match scores with Maraenui, Hastings, Hawkes Bay & Onga Onga all tied on 10 points.
Hastings having had some very convincing wins earlier in the tournament saw them sneak in 1st with 48.5 match points with Maraenui 2nd on 45.5, Hawkes Bay 3rd on 39.0 and Onga Onga on 37.0.
This saw Hastings defend their Greenwood Cup title by the narrowest of margins with the it all coming down to matches won or lost throughout the whole tournament.
Congratulations to the 2019 Greenwood Cup Champions Hastings Golf Club.
The Bretherton Buist Cup which goes to the highest seeded individual with the most wins over all 7 rounds was awarded to Sebastian Kettle who was undefeated with 7 out of 7 wins.
The Radonich Trophy which goes to the best place of the country courses saw Onga Onga make it 2 years in a row defending their title for 2019.
Full results:Greenwood Cup Results
