Par For The Course: Al Thani, Yousef show fine run of form

With the Open Championship at Royal Troon only a week away, there are only three ways left of actually qualifying to play in the 133rd Open: Scottish Open, Regional and Final qualifying tournaments.

The R&A have certainly taken a large step in making qualifying a lot more accessible and in some way affordable into golf's oldest championship by introducing International Final Qualifying events held on five continents - Africa, America, Asia, Australia and Europe.

The amount of places on offer at each stage of qualifying for an Open has never been large, but of the 120 players competing in the IFQ events in Africa, Asia and Australia were guaranteed four places whilst in America and Europe were guaranteed 12 places.

But arguably, the hardest route of qualification is through the regional qualifying competitions throughout Great Britain and Ireland which, if then successful, takes you to the Local Final qualifying rounds played around the Troon area on Saturday and Sunday before the Open week starts. There only 12 places are available from a probable starting line up of 400 quality player's.

But when last year's sensational winner Ben Curtis qualified through the Local Final Qualifying rounds it certainly gives everyone hope.

Yousef to compete

On the other side of the Open week build up, the leading junior golfers from 59 countries will compete in the Junior Open Championships at Kilmarnock Barassie Golf Club, Scotland. Held only minutes away from Royal Troon, the UAE representative Khalid Yousef will compete against a field of 120 strong golfers.

The last Junior Open was played in 2002 at Royal Musselburgh Golf Club with the winner, Cian McNamara producing three rounds of 71-65-71 for a three round total of 207.

The UGA sponsor, as part of the Junior Open, the 'Middle East Golf Trophy'.

Pan Arab meet

As many of our young junior golfers look forward to playing as much as they can during the summer holidays, the top national golfers were also in action at the Pan Arab Individual Championships at Cascades Soma Bay, Egypt.

Top performance of the week went to Thani Al Thani who won the Men's Bronze division with two Stableford rounds of 37 and 34 for a convincing six point win.

In the silver division, Khaled Yousef continued with his recent run of good form with a runner-up placing - just narrowly missing out on the top spot by one shot. Three shots adrift of Yousef was Abdulla Mosharrekh who claimed fourth place.

In the Silver division, Rashid Al Abbar had a respectable 13th place.

Al Abbar, Yousef and Al Mosharrekh have made great efforts to gain experience by competing in as many events as they can, both locally and internationally. Their golf is certainly getting stronger with time.