Marsh earns trip to Australia

The 20-year-old English Amateur Champion will go on a five-week trip Down Under with English Stroke Play champion Ben Stow from Wiltshire and South American Amateur champion Paul Howard from Lancashire.

The trio will be seeking to follow in the footsteps of a number of former internationals who have produced a string of successes in Australia over the years.

Marsh, a member of the Lightcliffe and Elland clubs before switching to Huddersfield, has been a full international for the past two years.

He won the English title at Saunton in August having lost a play-off for the Portuguese Championship and tied second in the Scottish Open Stroke Play.

These top level performances saw him finish runner-up on the Titleist/FootJoy England Golf Men’s 2014 Order of Merit.

Those successes earned him the sportsman of the year title at the Courier Sport Awards at The Venue, Barkisland recently.

The trio’s first serious action in Australia will be in the Masters of the Amateurs at Royal Melbourne on January 6 to 9, followed by the Lake Macquarie International at Belmont on January 14 to 17.

Then it’s on to the Australian Amateur Championship at The Australian and The Lakes golf clubs on January 20 to 25 before the New South Wales Medal at Monash and Killara on January 28 to 30.

Among the successes gained by English players in Australia recently, Tommy Fleetwood had three top 10 finishes in 2010 including runner-up in the New South Wales Amateur, while in 2011, Jack Senior won the New South Wales Amateur, beating Andy Sullivan in an all-English final.

The long-established 72-hole Lake Macquarie International at Belmont has seen several English winners such as Roger Chapman, Russell Claydon, Ricky Willison, Nick Dougherty and Adam Gee, while Ryan Evans (Wellingborough, Northamptonshire) triumphed last year and also won the 36-hole Avondale Medal.