Daily Times

MULTAN: The four-day 13th Pakistan Junior Amateur Golf Championship 2024, conducted by the Pakistan Golf Federation, concluded at the majestic Rumanza Golf Course DHA Multan here on Sunday. Around 70 young golf players participated in this national title bearing championship which had events in four age categories for boys and girls: Under-16 and Under-21. An admirable highlight of this junior championship was that the participating players displayed excellent golfing expertise and skills and the ultimate young one who emerged as the champion was Saad Habib Malik of Rumanza Golf Club Multan. Up against ferocious adversaries like M Irtiza Hussain of Margalla Greens Islamabad and Shameer Majid of Defence Raya Golf Club Lahore, Saad played formidable golf to emerge as the triumphant one and thereby win national acclaim. His final round score of gross 68 on Sunday was attributable to smart handling of his golfing technique and fetched him seven awe inspiring birdies on holes 2,4,9,11,12,13 and 16 and nine regulation pars that reflected on his sublime control over his hitting and the testing short game around the greens as well as on the greens.

He did face two hiccups also as he had a bogie on the 15th hole and an unlucky double bogie on the 18th hole where his ball got plugged in the bunker. Overall his aggregate score for the three rounds was 212, four under par compiled through a first round score of 72, a similar 72 in the second round and a final day’s most admirable 68. His rival Irtiza Hussain was certainly imposing technique wise and performed spectacularly with scores of 68, 75 and 72 and a championship aggregate of 215, yet had to be content with the runner-up slot. As for Shameer, his competitive presence was marvellous and he came third in the 16-21 years age category with three rounds scores of 74,74 and 74 and championship aggregate of 222. These three have shown first rate capabilities and hopefully with proper support can prosper into players of excellence. In the age category 12-16 years, the two proficient ones turned out to be Shayan Zia of PAF and Ahmed Ibrahim of Defence Raya Golf Club. They ended up the championship with scores level and as per rules had to go for a sudden death play-off and victory was achieved by Shayan. This championship was also used for selecting a team to represent Pakistan at the Asia Grand Final of the Nick Faldo Series due to be held in Vietnam in April. The selected boys are Saad Habib Malik (16-21 years ) and Shayan Zia (12-16 years).The selected girls are Humna Amjad of Peshawar Golf Club (16-21 years) and Bushra Fatima of Lahore Garrison Greens(12-16 years).