Golf: Alker in the money and heading for the PGA after second placing

Hamilton's Steven Alker confirmed he was PGA tour-bound with a tie for second place yesterday in the weather-affected Buy.Com Tour Championship in Pratville, Alabama.

The result earned Alker US$45,000 ($92,500) and saw him jump six places to fourth on the final money list with earnings of US$247,008 ($507,600) - well inside the top 15 cut-off that will see him debut on the prestigious United States PGA tour next season.

Yesterday's final round was washed out by rain, the leaders having completed just nine holes.

It forced organisers to use the scores through three rounds to determine final placings.

The United States' Patrick Moore was declared the winner. Moore shot a 10-under-par 206 through three rounds, two shots clear of Alker, alongside two other Americans, Mike Heinen and Jeff Klauk.

Alker, 30, was unlucky that the rain intervened as he was within one shot of the lead after nine holes yesterday.

Birdies on the seventh and eighth holes saw him lift to 10-under, one shot behind new leader Klauk. Moore was one stroke further back in third place.

The season-ending tournament - consisting of the top 55 money winners - carried the largest purse of the 28-tournament Buy.Com tour season, US$600,000 ($1.23 million).

Alker was 10th on the money list before the tournament, thanks to his tie for second place at last week's Hibernia Southern Open. He won one title this year - April's Louisiana Open following a playoff.

Moore's victory and US$108,000 ($221,900) prize lifted him from second to first on the final money list.

* In Kuala Lumpur, New Zealand coach Mal Tongue did not duck the issue after his team of Tim Wilkinson, Eddie Lee and Brad Shilton finished in a tie for fifth at the Eisenhower Trophy world amateur championships on Sunday night.

Touted as title contenders, they didn't fire as a combination until the closing nine holes in the last round, when their four-under-par 142 left them seven strokes adrift of the United States, who won the event for the 12th time.

Tongue blamed poor shot execution for his team's inability to be among the action on the final day and finish just one place higher than they did two years ago in Germany.

"We were good enough to do it this week but we simply didn't execute the shots," Tongue said.

"But in a funny sort of way it is nice to be ranked fifth in the world and still be pissed off.

"I don't care what anyone says, this team are world class.

"There's not another country in the world here who swing the club and have the technical expertise that we've got.

"We [New Zealand] are just a tinpot little place, and I don't mean that disrespectfully, and the things that New Zealand achieve in golf are just incredible."

Tongue won't again get the chance to work with Wilkinson, Lee or Shilton in his capacity as the Golf Association's director of coaching.

All three are turning professional, with Lee taking up his qualifying exemption for Asia's Davidoff Tour, which he earned by winning the Maekyung Open in Seoul in May.

Wilkinson, who was the fourth-leading individual in Kuala Lumpur, left last night for the second stage of qualifying for the European Tour in Spain and Shilton is preparing for the Australasian PGA Tour qualifying school.

Tongue wants to name a 10-strong squad as early as January to begin preparing for the 2004 Eisenhower Trophy in Puerto Rico.

- NZPA