Semi-final line up set for Scottish Amateur Championship at Gullane

Two years after Adam landed the title at Royal Dornoch, Finnie is through to Saturday morning’s semi-finals in this year’s edition at Gullane.

He meets Kintore’s Mark Thomson in the last four at the East Lothian venue while Inverurie’s Greg Ingram takes on Chris Somers of Murcar Links in the other match.

Finnie, who shot rounds of 66-67 to finish joint-second in the stroke-play qualifying earlier in the week, had two contrasting matches on Friday.

He eased past Murrayfield Stuart Thurlow by 7&6 in the morning but then had to dig deep to get past Dunbar’s Callum Kenneally on the final green in the afternoon.

Thomson, meanwhile, overcame Finnie’s Royal Burgess clubmate Malcolm Pennycott 2&1 in the morning before adding a 4&3 victory over Murcar man Adam Giles.

Heading into the final day, Ingram, in fairness, looks the man to beat. He’d already knocked out top seed Dominic McGlinchey (The Renaissance Club) in reaching the last 16.

In another eye-catching performance, he accounted for host club member and 2024 Lothians champion Sam Hall by 4&3 before beating Crail’s Andrew Davidson, who finished joint-third in this season’s Lytham Trophy, by the same margin.

Somers, though, won’t be a pushover if his wins on Thursday against Mark Napier (Dundas Parks) and Baberton’s Jake Edgcombe are anything to go by.

Earlier in the day, 2022 winner and Gullane member Oliver Mukherjee went out at the last hole to Kenneally.

The semi-finals get underway at 8am on Saturday, with the 18-hole final scheduled to start at 12.30pm.

Meanwhile, Paul Lawrie lost ground in the Staysure PGA Seniors Championship after having to settle for a second-round 76 at Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeen.

On six over, the Aberdonian headed into the weekend with work to do in his bid to go one better than last year, with Stephen Gallacher (74-74) the top Scot at the halfway stage on four over.