Golf: Organisers hopeful of securing Lee for NZ Open

Golf fans will have to be patient for at least another month while they wait for confirmation of the dates of the next New Zealand Open.

It has been three months since New Zealand Golf announced the Open would not be held in 2008 - it is moving to March - and nearly nine months since the 2007 tournament teed off at The Hills.

NZG chief executive Bill MacGowan says progress is being made but he will not hurry to reveal when the next Open will be played.

"We won't have confirmation until the first week of October at the earliest," MacGowan told the Otago Daily Times yesterday.

"We've got a lot of things churning around out there.

"We had a bit of a championship meeting last week in Auckland and we've got stuff coming to fruition.

"We've got to make some announcements soon because a lot of people want to be involved.

But we also don't want to announce anything until we've got rock-solid dates."

After the dates are confirmed, Open organisers will start confirming which players will start at the Queenstown course.

The name on everybody's lips is Danny Lee, and MacGowan expects to see the world's leading amateur at The Hills.

"Danny will be there somewhere, somehow.

"From a New Zealand Golf point of view, we'd be certain to make sure he's playing.

"The young man's done ever so well in the last two months and there would be a lot of excitement, I'm sure, in seeing him play at home."

Lee will first lead the New Zealand team at the Eisenhower Trophy in Adelaide from October 16 to 19.

 

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