ABU DHABI // Eager to bury memories of play-off defeats in the past two Junior Opens, Daniel Hendry played the first eight holes in two-under par at Abu Dhabi Golf Club yesterday on the way to a 75 that won him a trophy, a digital camera and a glittering opportunity.
With the lowest gross score among the 20 males and eight females who competed in intrusive heat, Hendry snared a spot in the Abu Dhabi Junior Golf Championship presented by The Daily Telegraph and scheduled for November 28-30 at the Abu Dhabi Golf Club. That "junior major" will place Hendry alongside the top 10 from the United Kingdom and Ireland and into a 16-year-old's daydream.
"It means everything for me," said the Dubai resident who already has played for the Scotland boys under-18s. "The Daily Telegraph is obviously a very big event. That's probably going to be the biggest event so far that I have played." His long-term vision includes college golf in the United States and then professional golf, and in such soaring career goals Hendry had company yesterday in the form of the 13-year-old Sana Tufail.
The winner of the Emirates Golf Federation invitational Ladies Matchplay at Al Badia Golf Club in Dubai in May, Tufail posted the girls' low gross score on Saturday with an 83.
"That normally would be a terrible score," she said, "but considering the conditions ... "
The conditions included: "We were all lying down, waiting for the group ahead of us. It was very, very difficult to score low." The prizewinners included Ronan Hall (first place, boys nett), Kavita Sehmi (first place, gifts nett), Darren Hall (boys Stableford, in a back-nine playoff), Harry Baldock (second place, boys Stableford), Harley Knight (nearest the pin) and Katy Rutherford (nearest the pin, girls).
