Granger retains FNB golf title

GALE NGAKANE
Correspondent | Tuesday August 31, 2010 00:00

In the battle for second spot, Peter Lekgoa emerged tops after winning the come back following a tie with Mpho Kelosiwang. Both players had grossed 155.

Oganeditse Marata clinched fourth position with a score of 158 followed by Walter Seokemong with 160. B Division player, Enoch Mushango gave the A Division winners a scare with an overall gross of 158.  He scored an overall net of 136, to be declared champion ahead of Republic Leswadula, who recently moved to Gaborone from Selebi-Phikwe.

 Pat Magowe finished third. Mushango, with a handicap of 11, was on a mission as early as the first day (Saturday) when he scored a gross of 75 and a net of 64.

Though he was dismissed as a fluke, the internal audit manager at Botswanapost could not help waxing lyrical about his play.  'My chipping around the browns was excellent.

I know how to chip the ball on to the browns because I started my golf in the browns of Selebi-Phikwe. My irons were good,' he said. Mushango surmounted holes number three and 12, which proved difficult for other players.

The battle-lines were drawn on Sunday with the champion, Granger, making sticking with Mushango as they set out on the browns.

At one point, Mushango was a point ahead of the champion and a possibility of a play-off loomed until the 15th hole when his (Mushango's) ball sailed into the trees. It greatly compromised his game, to such an extent that other A Division players like Lekgoa, Kelosiwang and Marata overtook him. Meanwhile Kelosiwang, who is Botswana Golf Union (BGU) secretary general, said they are making concerted efforts to develop cricket in schools by targeting to recruit at least 500 students to the game. 

'We would like every golf club to visit schools and introduce the game to the children,' he said. In the south (Gaborone), BGU has hired Lekgoa as a full time development officer and he will be visiting schools to spread the game.

Kelosiwang urged the north to look for a development officer as a matter of urgency. BGU wants caddies to be registered as players in order to develop them. 'After all, some good golfers were once caddies,' he stated.