By HENRY MORABANG
PAPUA New Guinea’s golfing fraternity is proud that two PNG tournaments on the Queensland Sunshine Tour have been nominated for the Tournament of the Year awards.
The PNG Open in Port Moresby and the Morobe Open in Lae were nominated for the top golfing awards.
Broc Greenhalgh, the Queensland Tournament coordinator for PGA of Australia – Queensland division, said it was a very exiting time for the PNG tournaments and both events should be proud of their efforts.
Greenhalgh said each club was rated by seven professionals who make up a voting panel, all of which played more than 90% of the available rounds to them.
He said the rating of the event are based on prize money, course condition, tournament atmosphere, new initiative, organisation level, speed of play, pin positions, presentations, amateur prizes, functions and overall professionalism
Greenhalgh said some of the Australian players who participated in the PNG Open and Morobe Open such as Brad Andrews went on to win the Callaway Order of Merit and Brad Burns who won the Morobe Open also went on to win three other tournaments
throughout the year and also finished fifth on the order of merit.
Another Australian player Andrew Bonhomme who went on to make Queensland Sunshine Tour History.
The not only won eight QLD Sunshine Tour events in 2007, they included the six richest events on the schedule including the PNG OPEN.
Bonhomme made history by winning the most prize money ever set in one QLD Sunshine Tour year winning over A$94,000 K268,500) just in Queensland.
In addition to this milestone he also capped it off by winning the Queensland PGA Championship on the Von Nida Tour.
Greenhalgh said this is the first year the PNG Open has been nominated for the award and in 2006 the Morobe Open was nominated in the top four but was pipped by the Capricorn Rydges Golf Classic.
He said the events in PNG are two of the best in all of the categories mentioned above.
The atmosphere was terrific and the spirit the game is played throughout the two weeks is nothing less than sensational.
“We are extremely happy to be able to make the trip to PNG each year putting on a great show for the members and guests of both clubs and help create an opportunity that many other sports don’t offer – paying with a professional in a competitive
atmosphere,” he said.
Greenghalgh said the prize money at both events in 2008 will break all records set before with the Morobe Open worth A$60,000 - a 20% increase from 2007 - and the PNG Open offering a whopping $80,000-plus (K228,000) daily prizes.
This increase in prize money is why the quality of the professionals set to make the trip this year will be second to none.
PNG Golf Association president Stan Walker said it was good news for PNG and he will be traveling south soon to attend the presentation ceremony on behalf of the two clubs as president.