Shaw-Radford Stars at Sunningdale

Huddersfield’s Dylan Shaw-Radford (right) got the 2024 season off to a great start, partnering his England teammate Harley Smith to the prestigious Sunningdales Foursomes title.

Male professionals play off +1, male amateurs off scratch, lady professionals play off 2 and lady amateurs receive three shots.

The first two rounds saw both Sunningdale’s Old and New courses used, with all matches from the 3rd round onwards over the Old.

Shaw-Radford and Harley (The Rayleigh Club) prevailed 5&4 in the final over home golfer William Shucksmith and Darryl Gwilliam (Coventry), who reached the final by way of a tense 1-up semi-final win against Yorkshire Men’s pair, Tom Osborne (Lindrick) and Charlie Daughtrey (Rotherham).

Osborne and Daughtrey had accounted for another Yorkshire county player, Alex Boyes (Teesside) and his Wynyard partner Jack Burton in the quarter-finals, 3&2. Boyes has been called up to represent England’s mixed junior team in Spain.

Osborne and Daughtrey had earlier produced a win over tour professional Eddie Pepperell and his pro partner Rob Harrhy.

New professional George Ash (Hallowes) and his partner Mia Eales-Smith (Lindrick) made it to the 3rd round before losing narrowly 1-up to Abbeydale professional Gareth Davies and his partner Robert Harris (Lincoln). Davies/Harris would themselves go out by the same margin in the 4th round.

For the eventual champions, a first round match that went down the 20th was followed by three comfortable wins before their quarter-final against St Neots pair Oliver Toyer and Sam Marshall was edged 1-up.

Shaw-Radford and Smith then had the benefit of a walkover in their semi-final when John Wilding and Ellie Gower withdrew.

It meant they were fresh for the afternoon’s final match against Gwilliam/Shucksmith.