English Golf Union send Coupland
and Thistleton down Mexico way

David Coupland and Mark Thistleton, both members of the England ‘A’ Squad, will represent the English Golf Union in the annual Mexican Amateur Championship and International Pairs Tournament in Mexico City on 27th - 30th March.
Coupland, from the Boston club in Lincolnshire, will turn 22 just prior to the championship. He will be making his first overseas trip for the EGU.
Included in the England ‘A’ Squad for the first time this year, he is a regular county player, who enjoyed some fine performances in 2007. He played in the Open Championship at Carnoustie after winning his Final Qualifying stage at Monifieth while he also finished tied third individual in the Midland Qualifying for the English County Championship.
A fourth place was also secured in the Lincolnshire Championship and equal seventh in the North of England Youth Championship. Thistleton, from Hayling Golf Club, is a former Hampshire Champion and the winner of the Lagonda Trophy in 2006.
Like Coupland, he is a newcomer to the England ‘A’ Squad following a successful 2007. He won the Selborne Salver after a playoff, qualified second in the Amateur Championship and made a solid defence of the Lagonda Trophy by finishing tied third. He also represented the EGU in the Finnish Amateur and Hampshire in the County Championship finals.
The Mexican Amateur is played over 72 holes of stroke play with the International Pairs Tournament running alongside, the aggregate scores each day of both players counting. This will be the sixth occasion that the EGU has sent players to the event but the title has yet to be brought back to England.
Kent’s Lloyd Campbell and David Skinns from Lincolnshire won the pairs event in 2005, while full internationals Matt Cryer from Warwickshire and Cheshire’s Paul Waring finished third in the pairs in 2006.