Golf: Exams to sideline top BoP players

School examinations mean Bay of Plenty will have to do without two of their top players for the Tower interprovincial men's teams championships next week.

Missing from the event at New Plymouth's Ngamotu course will be New Zealand senior representative Sam Hunt and national under-19 representative Bradley Iles.

The two Rotorua schoolboys are skipping the championships to concentrate on their school exams.

But Bay of Plenty, the losing finalists three times in the past six years, will still field a team capable of winning.

Kent Skellern and Nicholas Davey are proven matchplay exponents, Andrew McNair and George Kinghorn were in the team last year, and the young and talented Jae An has been selected at No 5.

Canterbury will head to the championships, which start on Tuesday, with only two members of the team who won the crown last year - No 1 Eddie Lee and No 3 Andrew Hobbs.

Canterbury's strength is shown by the selection at No 5 of Matthew Peter, the runner-up at the national amateur championships this year.

Waikato are among the favourites, with exciting young talent in Mathew Holten, Brad Shilton and Glenn Millin, backed by the excellent Mark Purser and Evan Woolf.

The Auckland team comprises Logan Holzer, Franz Schwanner, Clarke Osborne, Geoff Sisson and Andrew Lawson.

Former cricket international Alex Tait heads the Northland side, who also include Shaun O'Shea, Jeremy Hay, Michael Perrin and Iain Power.

North Harbour have Chris Johns, Sam Sullivan, Phil Mosley, Scott Johnson and Josh Carmichael.

The teams play six rounds from Tuesday to Friday. The top four clash in the semifinals on Saturday morning, with the final in the afternoon.