16 IRISH IN KPMG WOMEN’S IRISH OPEN

A record 16 Irish players will tee it up this Thursday in the KPMG Women’s Irish Open on the Palmer South Course at The K-Club.

The Irish group is made up of nine professionals and seven amateurs, hopefully they will give the home crowds something to cheer about at the weekend.

World No. 82 Leona Maguire is delighted to see so many Irish women in the field and is also hoping for an Irish winner.

“It would be fantastic [to have an Irish winner],” Maguire said, who remains the only Irishwoman to win on the LET following her victory at the Aramco Team Series – London. “What you ideally want is a home winner of your national open.”

“It’s really nice to see so many Irish girls on the LET right now. It’s become really strong. The guys had that for a number of years on the DP World Tour and now it seems the girls have passed them. They’ve dropped in numbers and we’ve significantly gained. It’s a testament to how strong women’s golf is in Ireland right now.”

“Aine [Donegan] has been close a couple of times [to winning on the LET]. Sara [Byrne] and Lauren [Walsh] have been close, Anna Foster has been close. We’ve had some Irish flags up the right end of the leaderboard over the last couple of years so yeah, it would be fantastic to see one of us get it over the line this year.”

The nine professionals in the field are…….Leona Maguire, Lauren Walsh, Sara Byrne, Canice Screene, Olivia Mehaffey, Anna Foster, Aine Donegan, Beth Coulter, Annabel Wilson.

The seven amateurs are…….Katie Poots, Emma Fleming, Anna Abom, Ella Cantwell, Olivia Costello, Kate Dillon and Anna Dawson.

Fingers crossed one of them will be holding the KPMG Women’s Irish Open Trophy come Sunday evening!

Photo: The Irish girls at the tournament pose for picture on the 18 green of the South Course at the K-Club. Credit: Mark Runnacles/LET