Hayling golfer Toby Burden’s stellar County Championship record ends with quarter-final loss at Stoneham

Last year, the Hayling ace reached a third final in a row – the first player to have done so since European Tour veteran winner Richard Bland, who claimed his first Sloane Stanley Challenge Cup in the third of those finals in 1994 before turning pro.

After two final defeats in 2006 and 2009, Toby finally claimed the biggest prize in amateur golf in the county with a win over then Hampshire captain Colin Roope in 2019, having spent six years as a mini-tour pro.

And over the next two years, he was only beaten by birdies on the last, firstly by clubmate Richard Harris, when Hayling hosted the COVID-affected championship in 2020.

Jersey’s Jo Hacker then finished birdie, birdie at North Hants 12 months ago to deny Burden a chance to join the list of 21 players who have won the title at least twice in the oldest county championship in the country, dating back to 1894.

Having made it into the top 16 by finishing in seventh place on two-under par, thanks to rounds of 72 and 70, he faced Test Valley’s Jamie Fluen.

He moved into the last eight despite having trailed to the plus-one player from north of the county three times in the match – and twice by two holes - before eventually winning 2&1.

In the quarter-final, he faced Stoneham’s Harrison Pake, who was not frightened of taking on the big guns, having already knocked out newly-crowned Hampshire Youths Champion Jamie Markwick 4&3.

Burden raced into a three-hole lead after just three holes with a birdie and two pars.

But amid some scrappy golf by both players, Pake clawed back two holes in a row with nothing better than a par.

After a Burden birdie at 11, a mistake at the short par-four 13 th gave Pake another lifeline.

And the Stoneham player, who sells advertising for a local radio station during the week, broadcast his intentions by winning the par-five 14th with a birdie.

That gave him the lead for the first time, but the crucial blow to Burden’s title hopes came on 16 when a delicate chip from just off the green bit on the fringe and stuck.

Another couple of inches would have seen the ball roll down the shoulder of the green to the hole.

That bogey four meant Toby had to make a three on the penultimate hole to stand any chance of taking the match down the 19th .

But he saw his 20-footer for a three go by the hole on the right and dive left – to nestle a ball’s width behind the hole.

Two putts from 15 feet were all Pake needed to reach the last four, and complete an all-Stoneham semi-final line-up against eventual winner James Freeman.

For true-blue Pompey fan Burden, the thought of winning a second Sloane-Stanley Cup in Southampton was driving him on, but the fluid golf of the last three years just eluded him.

in-form US college star Joe Buenfeld, a former Junior European Open winner, beat Ryan Moody in the other semi, before losing to his best friend Freeman in the final.

Freeman, who won the Hampshire Youths title at Hayling two years ago, to go with his two Hampshire Junior titles won in 2018 and 2020, was eight-under par for 21 holes.

That was one better than Buenfeld, who could only shake his former college room-mate’s hand warmly as Freeman hit his 90-yard approach to kick-in range on the third extra hole, in one of the best finals in living memory.

Rowlands Castle’s Darren Wright snuck into the matchplay thanks to a fine 70 in the second round, having opened with a 75.

That edged out clubmate Tom Robson, the winner of the 2009 county championship, after the fellow Hampshire first-team player shot 71 and 75 to sit on two-over.

But Wright, the former England amateur international who missed the county championships at his peak because of a clash with the St Andrews Links Trophy, could not progress beyond the first round.

He was four-down after seven against Moody, who claimed the Pechell Salver, for the leading qualifying score on eight-under.

His run to the final was ended by Buenfeld, who made a total of 31 birdies and three eagles in 104 holes over the course of three days.