On Monday, Sidmouth seniors visited Honiton for the return leg of their contest, having won the home tie in April, writes Charles Oram.

The course at Honiton, although high up in the hills, is fairly flat, so it presented an unusual challenge to the Sidmouth side who are not used to playing a ball that is level with their feet!

With the recent defeat at Sidmouth fresh in their minds, the first Honiton pairing of Bill Eaton and Norrie Fleet were not in a charitable mood and gave Doug Goodall and John Bainbridge no quarter, to record a win for Honiton by four-and-three.

Things soon looked brighter for Sidmouth, however, with victories in the next two matches. Although giving shots to the opposition, Alan Billingshurst and Brian Cole won three-and-two, with Cole birdying the par 4 third.

Honiton also had no answer to John Townsend’s bright blue check trousers, as he and Tony Crow triumphed two-and-one, with Crow scoring a two on a short hole.

Townsend, as well as giving a passing sartorial impersonation of John Daly, is becoming the ‘come-back kid’ of seniors golf. In this match, as well as the one last week at home against Teignmouth, he had been trailing by four shots after just six holes holes, and on both occasions ended as a winner.

Unfortunately, it was downhill from here, since the remaining three matches all went to Honiton. Roger Freer and Les Pratt lost by one hole and Ray Gunston and Peter Emery went down three-and-two.

Gunston and Emery are both persuasive characters, but were unable to persuade their opponents to miss a few putts. Terry Carter and Brian Skittrall succumbed in the final match two-and-one.

To be fair to Carter, the weather probably did not suit him. Coming as he does from a particularly wet part of Western Scotland, the warm and dry conditions must have been very challenging. So Honiton won the day 4-2.

There are no prizes for guessing who won nearest the pin - yes, it was Les Pratt again, for the fourth time this year. If they gave a bottle of wine for nearest the pin on every hole, he would surely break the course record by a considerable margin!