Former Pompey Academy striker Harris wins Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Channel Islands golf championship

But the former East Lodge forward, who played alongside Joel Ward and Matt Ritchie as they came up through the ranks at Portsmouth, is now a champion in his own right.

The Hayling Golf Club champion for 2020 added the famous Sloane-Stanley Challenge Cup to his trophy cabinet after becoming the 80th player to win the Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Channel Islands Amateur Championship.

It was the 100th year since the silver cup was presented to the 127-year-old Hampshire, IoW and CI Golf Union by the family who owned the Paultons Park estate in the New Forest and the original Bay House School building in Gosport – plus a large chunk of Chelsea real estate off London’s King’s Road.

Harris prevented clubmate Toby Burden – the defending champion – from becoming the first back-to-back winner since 1982.

Victory was secured after some very late drama which saw him lose a three-hole lead with five to play as Burden sank a 50-foot birdie putt to raise hopes of making his own history by becoming just the second player to defend the Sloane-Stanley title on his home course – and the first since Stoneham’s David Harrison in 1974.

Harris, a former Cams Hall member, sank a snaking 12-footer on the 18th in front of a handful of Hayling members on the clubhouse balcony overlooking the 18th green.

A delighted Harris was just relieved the final did not go into extra-time.

He said: ‘I was very, very nervous over those last couple of holes.

‘But when Toby went to the back of the green on the 18th, I knew if I could keep it on the front left I should have a putt to win it.

‘There was three feet of break, but I had a really good read and, like Toby, I know the greens at Hayling really well.

‘I put the perfect strike on it and from three feet out I knew it was in, even if I didn’t want to walk after it.’

Harris added: ‘Toby didn’t play his best, but once I got three-up after nine I wasn’t fazed by the situation. My thought was to continue to be aggressive.’

Harris made a total of 16 birdies and two eagles over the course of 72 holes in the county championship, which was shortened by two rounds because of the pandemic.

He said: ‘I wanted to get to four and five up as quickly as possible.

‘Then Toby would have had to come after me and try to win holes, which could have forced him into mistakes.

‘When my birdie putt hit the flag on the 14th and spun away, I feared it might open the door.

‘When he holed a monster putt on the par three 16th, I just had to try and hole my bunker shot from an impossible lie.

“But it made it easier to take as that was a one-in-a-thousand shot.

‘I hit a terrible tee shot on the 17th – I just quit on it. But luckily it didn’t cost me in the end.’