Daily Times

LAHORE: The golfing combat for honours, illustriousness and accolades will take place on Monday (today) at the Lahore Gymkhana Club Golf Course between a 20-member Lahore team and a 20-member Rawalpindi-Islamabad team comprising of top ten leading professionals of the national scene and top ten amateurs. This match play encounter will certainly provide abundant belligerence as players of excellence representing both cities will be up against each other for an 18-hole hostility oriented battle of skills. Such confrontations amidst highly skilled players are rather rare although they are a source of enchantment for fans who are always on the lookout for skill loaded engagements that unveil playing calibre and proficient handling of the challenges. And all compliments to an enthusiastic and fervent golfer Asghar Ali Sherazi of Netracon Technologies who has stepped forward to endorse this marvellous golfing activity that allures to Lahore Gymkhana players of the prowess and standing of Mohammad Shabbir Iqbal, the top ranked star champion of the country, besides leading professionals like Muhammad Munir, M Nazir, Ansar Mehmood, Ali Naqas, Asad Khan, Bilal Hussain Shah, Zubair Hussain, Minhaj Maqsood and Hamza Amin, all part of the Rawalpindi-Islamabad team.

And as Ali Sherazi highlighted purpose and intent is to flaunt and parade masterly adeptness in powerful hitting, accurate shot making from the fairways and splendid putting on the greens without being unnerved by strains of competition.

At stake is esteem and adulation and for a change these potent and authoritative ones will not be competing for personal glory or benefits but for the radiance and resplendence of the cities they are representing. That enhances the acute sense of responsibility. And while the golf professionals of Rawalpindi-Islamabad will be at their finest, the professionals who appear as members of the Lahore team will be under duress to ensure sparkle and luminosity for the host city. The captain of Lahore team is Shahid Javed Khan, a golf player of enormous experience and he will be supported by golf professionals like Usman Ali, Muhammad Alam, M Shahzad, Tallat Ijaz, Aadil Jehangir, M Afzal, Akber Mehroze, Aasher Hanif and Ahmed Baig, the remarkable and exceptional one of the national golf scene.

As for the ten amateur members of Rawalpindi-Islamabad team, they are Haider Atiq, Ralfe Raja, Umer Farooq, Amir Farooq, Umar Khokher, Atif Bhatti, Asif Kayani, Taimoor Hassan, Salman Khan and Hassan Abbasi. The amateurs representing Lahore team are Salman Jahangir, Qasim Ali Khan, Nauman Ilyas, Ahsan Khawaja, Ahmed Zaffar Hayat, Mohsen Zafar, Danish Javed, Hussain Hamid, Furqan Bucha and Ahmed Jibran. The line up of the amateur teams is classy and each team member is merited and enjoys a paramount standing.

The format of the Golf Challenge Cup is that a Rawalpindi-Islamabad professional will be pitched against a Lahore professional for one point advantage and similarly an amateur of each team will play against an amateur of opposing team for one point .At the same time they will also play a four-ball on best ball format for one point. At stake are a total of 30 points and a team accumulating 15.5 points or more will emerge as the winner. It will be a spiritedly fought out championship and participating players will be at their admirable best during the contest for ascendancy and mastery.