The 127th edition of the oldest National Amateur Golf Championship outside of the U.K. gets underway from the 22nd -27th April 2014 at the Nuwara Eliya Golf Club.
The very first national championship of Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) was played at the Nuwara Eliya Golf Club in 1891, which incidentally is also celebrating 125 years of its existence. This championship was initially played twice a year alternating between Colombo and Nuwara Eliya. The two world wars interrupted this bi-annual feature and since 1946 it has been played annually under the control of the Sri Lanka Golf Union.
India’s No. 1 Udayan Mane is pitted as the favourite for Sri Lanka title. India has sent two lady golfers Astha Madan and Tvesa Malik to vie for the Ladies Championship which is being played simultaneously. Former Sri Lanka title holder Suwen Selvaratnam, up-coming hopeful Kishani Vethavinayakam, Rasika Ekanayake (finalist 2013), Michelle Mirchandani and Roshi Sangani will be the local favourites for the Ladies National Title.
The Men’s Championship kicks off with 2 stroke play rounds on the 22nd and 23rd April to qualify 32 golfers for the match play knock out segment and the 2 finalists will play on Sunday 27th April. The 2 stroke play rounds will also count in the International Team Event for the Parlakemedi Trophy while Pakistan and Sri Lankan teams will also have their scores notched up for the Zia-ul-Haq Trophy. The players with best individual gross and net scores on day 1 will win the Victoria Cup and Illangakoon Trophy respectively.
Sri Lanka National Team – Sisira Kumara/P. Hemantha
Sri Lanka A Team – Danusha Perera/D.M. Pradeep
Sri Lanka B Team – Vinod Kumar/G.M. Pradeep Kumara
India – Udayan Mane/Aman Raj
Pakistan – MansoorTeli/Salman jehangir
Bangladesh – MD Sahib Ali/Ismail
Thailand – Chanachok Dejpirattanamongkol / Nattawat Suvajanakorn
The ladies too will have plenty to play for during the qualifying stage of 2 stroke play rounds competing for the Leonard Peiris Cup, the Firestone/Jepson Cup, the Lilamani Weeraratne Trophy, the Pin Fernando Trophy and the FB de Mel Cup.
Senior men aged 50+ will be contending for the Senior Champion title over 2 rounds.
