THE Rayleigh Club had a busy week as it played host to the East Anglian Open.

The event saw nearly 100 professionals from the eastern region competing, followed by a pro-am event and the club’s domestic competitions.

The Open was a very close fought contest with each golfer trying to improve on his order of merit status.

In the later stages the contest look like going into a play-off between Paul Hethington and Ian Ellis who both came into the clubhouse with identical rounds of 71 and 68 (-7).

But the winner over the two days was Crue Elliott who had rounds of 69 and 68 to finishing with an amazing -9.

Rayleigh golfer Mark Hooper finished top of the Order of Merit list with Jason Levermore a close second.

Only one point separated the winning teams in the pro-am with professional Steve Cipa and his team of Tony Brown, Jason Moody and Martin Stone managed to beat professional Hooper, club owner Jamie Saitch, manager Greg Vassallo and Roy Carter when they came in with scores of -16 and -15 respectively.

On the domestic scene the ladies held their autumn meeting which saw Julie Delves (30) take the honours coming in with 35 points ahead of Diane Barkwith (12) who came in second on countback from Kunju Patel (35) when both had 34 points Tracy Sutton (26) took the ladies’ montly medal with a net 79, beating Nicola Lee (19) who finished with a net 83.

On day one of the monthly medal the Division One title went to Jack Nicholls (2) who finished with a net 72. Keith Ritchie (12) came in second with a net 73.

Malcolm Reynolds (19) took the Division Two title with a net 71, ahead of Robin Reville (15) who had a net 77.

In the same competition Graham Levett scored a hole-in-one on the par three 13th hole.

Day two saw Ted Keeble (11) take the Division One honours with a net 71 ahead of Ricky Lee (+2) who finished with a net 73.

The Division Two prize went to Lawrie Page (17) who had a net 73, beating Ian Bement (15) who had a net 76.

Rounding up the week was the four ball better ball summer knockout final which went right to the 18th hole.

The partnership of Alan Dartnell and Jon Vigors made the winning putt to beat Tony Brown and Jason Moody.