Forbes reaches final of Carnegie Shield
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Allan Cameron and John Forbes were both bidding to follow in the footsteps of previous Inverness winners Brian Fraser (1970), Gordon Fraser (1974) and Fraser Urquhart (1987).
Neither Cameron or Forbes had made it through to the semi-finals in previous attempts but after defying wind and rain in the earlier part of the tournament, Forbes took on the tag of favourite with a first seeding after cards of 65 and 76.
Cameron had come through the qualifying rounds with scores of 83 and 82, but in the vastly improved weather on the final day, he was in a strong position to upset the seedings and eliminate Forbes at the last four stage.
Four ahead after 12 holes, Cameron then found himself in the bunker from the 13th tee, forcing him to concede Forbes’ eight foot putt for birdie.
The next hole also went against him as Forbes made a 20-yard birdie putt to put himself firmly back into the with four holes left to play.
Cameron simply could not recover and Forbes managed to get back on level terms before eventually securing an impressive comeback to win by one hole on the final green after Cameron three putted.
Unfortunately for Forbes, he could not quite repeat these heroics in the final against Oxford’s Paul Dolton, from the highly regarded Frilford Heath Golf Club
He had quietly come through his previous games almost unnoticed until he defeated previous three-time winner Andrew Biggadike (Olympic Golf Club) by 3 and 2 in the other semi-final.
When they teed off in the final, Forbes remained favourite to win the trophy simply because of Dolton’s lack of experience on links courses and even when the Englishman took a two hole lead after nine holes, Forbes was still expected to make a recovery when holding the length advantage going into the wind on the back nine.
Dolton, however, kept to his gameplan of finding fairways from the tee and relying on a short game that included some fine putting that eventually saw Forbes beaten 3 and 2.
