WALLACE BOOTH LETS IT SLIP AT LA 

MANGA,  FINISHES JOINT SIXTH

NEWS RELEASE
Comrie's Wallace Booth wasted a golden chance to claim his first win of the season by suffering a final -round collapse in the climax to the ECCO Tour Winter Series at Spain’s La Manga Club.
European Challenge Tour member Booth, older brother of European ladies’ star Carly Booth, went into the final round of the Mediter Real Estate Masters one stroke ahead over Sweden’s Jacob Lennemo after carding rounds of 71 and 69.
But the 28-year-old from Perthshire struggled to recover from a poor start on La Manga Club’s South Course and eventually had to settle for a share of sixth place, two strokes behind winner, Steven Jeppesen from Sweden.
Booth had high hopes of claiming the first prize of nearly €11,000 when he started his last round but his problems began almost immediately at the par-four fourth hole where he ran up a triple-bogey 7.
The 2009 Walker Cup star was still one of 15 players in with a chance of victory as he began his back nine but three successive bogeys put paid to his challenge as he finally returned a four-over-par 77 to finish on a total of 217.
Booth said: “You have got to put the ball into play off the tee on La Manga Club’s South Course because the greens are very fast and you need to attack the pins from the correct spots. I’m afraid I didn’t do that enough.”
The ECCO Tour is the Scandinavian equivalent of the EuroPro Tour and Booth revealed he entered the tournament – one of two held at La Manga Club this spring – to sharpen up his game for when the Challenge Tour gets into full swing.
He added: “I needed to kick-start my season. I didn’t want another six weeks without any competition and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.”
LEADING FINAL TOTALS
par 217 players from Scandinvia unless stated otherwise
215 Steven Jeppesen 71 71 73
216 Manuel Quiros (Spain) 79 70 67, David Palm 75 70 71, Daniel Lokke 74 70 72, Jacob Glennemo 70 71 75.
217 Lars Johannsen 70 77 70, Gustaf Kocken 73 74 70, Martin B Ovesen 72 72 74, Wallace Booth (Scotland) 71 69 77
218 Fredrik Gustavsson 75 67 76
219 Oscar Zetterwall 77 72 70, Benny Ahlenback 73 74 72, Jesper Lerchedahl 72 77 70