Golf: Harbour claw way out of rough

North Harbour, who have never won the national interprovincial golf championship, staged a stirring comeback to beat nine-time winners Canterbury in the second round at Titirangi yesterday.

No 5 Joon Sang Chung was one down with three to play against Nick Fry but won the next two and halved the last to win one up and clinch a 3-2 win for Harbour.

The other winners were Steven Han and Ben Jujnovich. No 1 Dean Sipson, recently selected for a New Zealand team, drew the television cameras but fell to Brad Stuart 2 and 1.

With heavy showers in the morning and a cold southerly in the afternoon, nobody was burning up the course.

Last year's semifinalists, Bay of Plenty, Waikato, Hawkes Bay and Wellington, all played once and won.

Amazingly, none of the teams that had two matches won more than one, and none of 60 individual games finished all square.

Harbour had their chances to beat Wellington in the morning. Jujnovich and Chung won but No 4 Scott Johnson was three up at one stage. He bogeyed the next three holes and finally lost 2 and 1.

The young Auckland team beat Tasman 3-2 in the morning but lost by the same margin to Otago in the afternoon. Auckland No 1 Leighton James came through the day with two wins and a great deal of credit.

In the morning he kept his cool over the closing holes to win on the last green, and in the afternoon he was behind Brent McEwan for much of the round before they came to the 18th all square.

McEwan put his second 8m away, and James was at least a metre further away. The Aucklander, as he had in a quadrangular against Waikato earlier in the year, drained his putt while his opponent fell short with his.

Bay of Plenty began the defence of their title with an impressive 4-1 victory over Tasman in their only game, with the five games taking four hours to complete.

Fifteen-year-old Danny Lee, putting a family illness behind him, demolished Aaron Reid 9 and 7. Josh Geary was almost as quick, beating Nick van Leeuwen 6 and 5.

The other winners were captain Mark Smith, recovered from an injured thumb, and Eddie Burgess. Jason McIntosh was beaten 4 and 3 by the experienced Nick Riddell.

Waikato also dropped only one game to Poverty Bay. Brendon Seidel, a late addition to the team after Martin Burger's road accident three weeks ago, lost to Tony Akroyd on the last green.