Golf: Master players line up to decide

Six New Zealand champions have been confirmed for a skins match as part of the New Zealand Open at Paraparaumu next month.

Sir Bob Charles, Greg Turner, Michael Campbell, Simon Owen, Matthew Lane and David Smail will play in a champion-of-champions skins match on Tuesday, January 8.

The players feature in a celebration of New Zealanders who have won the Open over the past 50 years.

Turner and Craig Perks will match up against Peter O'Malley and Peter Fowler in a transtasman challenge, with no entry charge for spectators, on January 7.

The champion-of-champions match will be played in the skins format over four holes - 1, 2, 3 and 18 - starting at 3 pm.

Charles is a four-time winner of the Open. He first won as an 18-year-old amateur in 1954, when he led from the first round to beat off challenges from Bruce Crampton and Peter Thomson at the Wellington Golf Club.

He set a four-round record of 273 to capture his second Open by 13 shots at Paraparaumu in 1966. His third title came four years later when he won by one shot from Australian Graham Marsh at The Grange, and his fourth was gained at Hokowhitu in 1973 when he overcame third-round leader Ian Stanley (Australia).

Turner has won the Open title twice, his first at Paraparaumu in 1989 by a remarkable six shots and his second at Middlemore in 1997.

Meanwhile, leading Australian golfer Nick O'Hern, who will be competing at the Open, said yesterday that players should be focusing on their game and not Tiger Woods when they tee off.

- NZPA

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