HAMPSHIRE stand on the brink of qualifying for both of the South East League Finals this weekend, with Harrison Pake’s Challenge League side needing just a draw from their last game against Kent to make it to the October final.
But the Stoneham member, who took over from Lawrence Cherry earlier this season when the county captain took up his dream job managing The Montgomerie Golf Club in Dubai, has warned his team against any complacency when they play the return fixture, this weekend.
Having beaten Kent 11-1 at North Hants GC last month, Pake is not taking any chances with his eight-man team’s preparations for the South Division title decider, having won two and lost one of their first three matches against Sussex and Sunday’s hosts.
Harrison has followed Cherry by remaining as a playing captain, having been in the first-team squad at the start of last season. But Pake has chosen to reveal nothing about his line-up for Sunday’s trip to Chislehurst to keep Kent’s captain guessing.
Pake said: “I don’t want to take this match lightly in any way – even if on paper we need just a draw to defend the title we won 12 months ago under Lawrence and reach the final again.
“We are travelling to Chislehurst with the attitude that we want to win and take care of business – and not rely on avoiding defeat. That’s not the mindset we want, getting defensive when it’s better to go for the win.
“Besides, after last month’s 11-1 victory, we are expecting a big reaction from Kent. That scoreline will have hurt – although it was very much down to how well we played.
“But I am not expecting them to just roll over and let us reach the final easily. They will want to avenge that defeat and will be going all out to beat us.”
As a result, Harrison was playing his cards very close to his chest on who will get a look at the unique challenge posed by the Chislehurst course, which measures a shade under 5,100 yards.
Its defence against players who can drive it nearer to the 300-yard mark are the sloping fairways and the small, undulating greens, characteristic of a Harry Colt design.
But only North Hants GC’s Robert Wheeler has experience of the Kent course from the players who crushed Kent in last month’s match at the Fleet club.
Pake added: “I am not going to give anything away about our line-up but obviously the guys who played at Chislehurst last year have told us what to expect.
“Our coach Kevin Flynn has been emphasising to the guys the need to practice their wedges and short game this week.
“We will come up with a plan for the foursomes and singles, once we have seen what condition the course is in. There’s a bit of rain about in the latter half of the week.”
Hayling GC’s Rich Harris who has played in all three Challenge League matches this season. Picture by ANDREW GRIFFIN / AMG PICTURES
Last season, Cherry had to cast around the full depths of his squad bringing in Stoneham pair Jack Warren and George Daniels having won two and lost the other South Division game last season going into the showdown.
And Cherry needed a win from Blackmoor’s Sam Parsons in the anchor match to eventually seal the 7-5 victory having led 3-1 after the morning session.
Since then, of course, Parsons – who also played in last year’s South East Challenge League Final which Hampshire lost to Essex, at Mill Hill GC – has regained his place in the first team, having won the Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Channel Islands Amateur Championship on his home course, in June.
Last year’s Blackmoor Bowl winner, who first played for the county colts back in 2016, including that year’s final win over Essex, is not eligible to face Kent, having appeared in two first-team matches this season already.
The eligibility rule would also rule Parsons out of the final, but Pake has brought 2020 county champion Richard Harris into the team with clubmate Joe Foster, as his foursomes partner after the win over Susesx at Waterlooville in May, when Harris picked up
The Hayling pairing have picked up three singles points out of four, and won one of their two foursomes matches so far.
The former academy player at Portsmouth, who appeared alongside the likes of Matt Richie and Marlon Pack, who are leading Pompey’s return to the Championship, took up golf after being forced to quit professional football after having a double hip replacement.
He made his first-team debut as long ago as 2016, off the back of a strong showing at the county championship at his home course at Hayling.
Now four years after he beat current county captain Toby Burden with a birdie on the last to lift the Sloane-Stanley Challenge Cup, Harris is showing that he can play county level golf away from his favourite links course.
His partnership with clubmate Joe Foster, who won the County Foursomes with Harris back in 2021 at Liphook brought maximum points against Kent at North Hants, so Pake must be tempted to retain that partnership.
After taking up the role when Cherry moved to the Middle East after the victory over Sussex at Waterlooville, in May, Pake confirmed he would follow Lawrence’s desire to use the South East Challenge League to blood some of Hampshire’s up-and-coming juniors.
North Hants GC’s Albie Beeston who claimed the Hampshire Junior Championship last month. Picture by ANDREW GRIFFIN / AMG PICTURES
Last year Harrison Price, from Stoneham, was a regular in the team, while Hartley Wintney’s Charlie Preston made his debut, and then was brought into the side for the final at short notice, when Hampshire, already without captain Cherry, needed an 11th hour injury replacement.
But after Albie Beeston’s play-off win over Stoneham’s former Hampshire U14s champion Freddie Gill in last month’s Hampshire Junior Championship, Pake would not be drawn on whether he had been tempted to give a debut to the North Hants teenager, who is still only just 15.
Pake said: “Everyone who played against Kent last month contributed to the win, so it would be easy to go with the same line-up, but I don’t want to give them any insight as to my team.
Hockley’s Luke Hodgetts is another survivor from last year’s final who played against Kent on the last day of The Open, and is keen to avenge that defeat at the hands of Essex, in the competition that replaced the U26 Colts League, which Hampshire won in 2022.
But the 2022 Selborne Salver winner, who works as a videographer in the professional game, missed the trip to Chislehurst so is another who faces having to learn the course like Pake – if selected.
Pake stressed whoever is named in his line-up for the fourth South Division match of the season would be fully focused on the task.
Harrison added: “We are really looking forward to the match, and getting that division title wrapped up so we can prepare for the final, and hopefully go one better than last year.”
A Kent victory would hand Sussex a place in the final, but the North Division title is unlikely to be decided until a couple of weeks before the showdown at Norfolk’s Wensum Valley, a regular stop in the early days of the EuroPro Tour.
Essex, the defending champions, still have two games to play and need to beat both Middlesex at home on September 8, before travelling to Bedfordshire three weeks later to reach the final.
Hampshire and Essex met 12 times in the South East Colts Final between 1969 and 2021, including seven times in the competition’s last year nine years.
The South Division winners came out on top in five finals against Essex, and claimed the title in a further three finals.
Hampshire would love nothing more than to complete the South East double – something they only managed once since the Colts League was formed in 1969, back in 1994.
•SOUTH EAST CHALLENGE LEAGUE STANDINGS
The Hampshire Colts team led by Lawrence Cherry after winning the South East Colts League in 2022 . Picture by HAMPSHIRE GOLF