The annual MERV PELL event is a stableford competition between several social golf clubs and was hosted by Mounties Social Golf Club on their home turf, Campbelltown golf course. This year, the clubs in attendance were Mounties, Cabramatta Leagues, Blacktown Workers and Revesby Workers.
Each club provides a team of eight players and two reserves. The total stableford score for the eight players (reserve player’s scores are not counted) will determine the winner of the MERV PELL trophy.
The rules for MERV PELL are simple, single stableford with no handicaps and preferred lies on fairways only.
In order to get 2 stableford points on a single hole, a player will need to shoot par, likewise, a birdie will get 3 points, a bogey will get 1 point and a double-bogey or worse will get zero points.
So don’t be surprised by the low scores as you need to shoot even par off the stick just to get 36 points 🙁
With no rain clouds to be seen and a lunch and free drinks on offer after the round, the forty (40) representative players all assembled on time for the scheduled hit-off at 7:30am.
Whilst twenty carts were booked for the event, only nineteen carts were made available, so two players traversed the course on their shank ponies 🙁
With Revesby having all A graders on call today, hopes were high for a good showing. Having played the same course last week, Revesby players were conversant with the current course conditions, in particular, the recently cored greens which made putting harder to judge. Some greens will be much slower than others and the bumpy nature of the surface will dent many a player’s confidence.
Play got under-way with half the players starting from the 1st tee and the other half from the 10th tee. The weather was perfect and after nine holes, players made use of their free snack and drink vouchers to fortify their shaky swings 🙂
To everyones credit, the games were completed in quick time, with Revesby players rushing back to the course clubhouse to find out how everyone went. Initial results looked encouraging, so after a quick post-mortem about shoulda, woulda, coulda on the golf course, it was off to the Mounties venue for lunch and presentations.
With forty score cards to process, it took some time before Mounties secretary, Brett Logan, announced the results.
On the whole, the scores were lower than scores from previous years.
The club scores in descending order were:
Revesby 165
Mounties 161
Blacktown 150
Cabramatta 140
The stand-out player for Revesby was the ever-reliable Shane Thorn with a terrific 27 points, followed closely behind by Ryan Johnston and Phil White with good scores of 24 points each. A fantastic debut effort from Shane and a good come-back performance from Snow White after a couple of years absence from the Merv Pell scene.
The biggest and most pleasing result was the improved performance from Ryan Johnston’s golf swing engine, as its been spluttering for many months – looks like he replaced it with a Supermarine Merlin engine and is now spitting fire 🙂
The Revesby middle-order all put in solid efforts around the 20 point mark (Wayne Coleman, John Varrica, George Lattouf and Ken Little) whilst the late-order was singularly led by Revesby’s Captain, Steve Vaughn, who put in a whirlwind innings to push the team past the winning post – we couldn’t have won without him 🙂
Not to be out-done by the Captain, the Revesby reserves (Ryan Cassin and Frank Saify) also showed their worth by posting solid scores worthy of being on the team – well done fellas 🙂
So, congratulations REVESBY WORKERS for winning the MERV PELL trophy for 2016 – it was a great team effort !
Mounties went close to winning and were only 4 points behind. The stand-out player was Brett Logan who still managed to post a solid 26 points on a dicky-knee, followed by Tim Summers with 23 points 🙂
Blacktown came third and would have been strong contenders had they selected their reserves to play. The stand-out player for Blacktown was Shaun Fulton with 26 points, followed by the lefty Danny Mick.., um, Mickle.., gosh, I think its Mickleson as he’s a lefty with a terrific short game. Got it now, its Danny Miklecic with 22 points 🙂
Cabramatta came fourth and will be disappointed with their performance today. Their stand-out player was Mitch Lloyd who posted a solid 24 points followed by John Wilson with 22 points.
Revesby also took a reasonable share of the prizes, with the following players receiving recognition:
Best 18 Hole Score:
Shane Thorn 27 pts
Best Reserve Player:
Frank Saify 21 pts
Best Back Nine Runners Up: John Varrica 13 pts
Best Secret Nine:
Ryan Johnston 13 pts
Longest Drive (3):
Ken Little
Many thanks must go to Mounties, in particular, Brett Logan and Rob Manning, for successfully organising the game, lunch and presentation under difficult circumstances. It was a pleasurable experience had by all 🙂
And Bravo Zulus to all the players from each club for their good spirit and camaraderie on and off the course.
Lastly, congratulations and thanks to the ten Revesby players who showed up today to represent the club and realise their potential with a fine victory !
MERV PELL Results on the day:
Revesby 165
Mounties 161
Blacktown 150
Cabramatta 140
Individual Results:
REVESBY WORKERS
Shane Thorn 27
Ryan Johnston 24
Phil White 24
George Lattouf 21
Ken Little 21
Wayne Coleman 20
John Varrica 19
Steve Vaughn 9
Frank Saify (Reserve) 21
Ryan Cassin (Reserve) 17
MOUNTIES
Brett Logan 26
Tim Summers 23
Rob Manning 22
Tan Truong 22
Pat Carbone 20
Emanuel Richards 18
Eddie Chambers 16
John Ioane 14
Phil Bartlett (Reserve) 17
Rob Krzton (Reserve) 16
BLACKTOWN WORKERS
Shaun Fulton 26
Danny Miklecic 22
Peter Lipovic 21
John Knudsen Jnr 19
Grahame Piper 19
Paul Hayes 17
Glen Latimore 13
Bill Wakim 13
Neil Morris (Reserve) 21
Wayde Tucker (Reserve) 19
CABRAMATTA LEAGUES
Mitch Lloyd 24
John Wilson 22
Gary Marsden 19
Matt Stephens 18
Tom Stephens 17
Wayne Brown 17
Brendon Mudaliar 13
Matt Holman 10
Marcus Tonga (Reserve) 10
Peter Holman (Reserve) 9
Best 18 Holes:
Outright: Shane Thorn 27 (Revesby)
Runner Up: Brett Logan 26 (Mounties)
Best Front Nine:
outright: Shaun Fulton 13 (Blacktown) c/b
Runner Up: Tan Truong 13 (Mounties)
Best Back Nine:
Outright: Mitch Lloyd 14 (Cabramatta)
Runner Up: John Varrica 13 (Revesby)
Secret Nine?:
Ryan Johnston 13 (Revesby)
Best Reserve:
Frank Saify 21 (Revesby)
Nearest To Pins:
4th: Phil Bartlett (Mounties)
6th: Tim summers (Mounties)
14th: Pat Carbone (Mounties)
17th: Emanuel Richards (Mounties)
Drive & Pitch:
9th: Phil Bartlett (Mounties)
18th: Wizza (Cabramatta)
Longest Drive:
3rd: Ken Little (Revesby)
