Guntley aiming to register a place in Portugal

Till salesman Kevin Guntley is hoping to cash in on home turf when he tees off in the Lombard Trophy regional final at Crieff Golf Club.

Guntley will pair up with host PGA Professional David Murchie for the event which is taking place on June 18 at the Perth and Kinross venue.

They will be aiming to book a trip to Portugal for the £41,450, Coca-Cola and Pestana Resorts supported, National Pro-Am grand final which will be played at the Vila Sol resort in the Algarve between September 20-21.

But 56-year-old Guntley, who has been a member at Crieff for 11 years, admits there will be some jitters despite being on familiar territory.

“I’m going to be feeling pretty nervous on the day,” he smiled.

“I was a bit surprised to find it was such a high-profile event, I won a Saturday medal event and then I was being asked if I was off to Portugal!

“There’s a bit of work before that can happen, but I’m looking forward to it.”

Guntley, who has been playing golf for 35 years, admits he did not intend to play at Crieff and he and Murchie originally had their eyes set on the Blairgowrie qualifier.

“Because I’m self employed, selling cash registers, I had an appointment on that day, so we looked and thought the Monday date would be the better one,” he explained.

“But may handicap has come down three strokes in the past two weeks and it’s 13 now - I was 16.

“Last week though I had a bad round so I hope that’s out of the way now.”

Guntley says he has little experience of playing alongside Murchie - which means the Lombard qualifier will be the first time they have had to get to know each other’s game.

“It’ll be doubtful we’ll get to have a practice round now, so I think it’s a case of teeing it up and hitting it, that’s basically it,” he added.

“The first club I ever joined has closed now, that’s how long ago it was, but Crieff’s a great course.”

Other teams taking part at Crieff include:    Ian Graham/Colin Campbell (Crow Wood); Ian Taylor/Charles Clark (Drumpellier);   Mel Douglas/Alistair easer (Inverness);   Stuart Reekie/Greg Doherty (East Renfewshire);    Norman Huguet/Shaun Tiffany (Musselburgh) and  Jason Boyd/Andrew Tringham (Montrose Golf Links Ltd)

For more information on the event at Crieff, click here.