John Murphy eagled his second last hole of the day today to jump into the lead after two rounds of strokeplay qualifying at the European Boys Team Championships in Czech Republic.  After opening with a bogey, John added two birdies to turn on -1.   He played steady par golf all the way back until a great eagle on the par five 17th saw him move to -3 and jump into the lead.  It was another good day for Ireland as they took four of the first five spots, and finished 23 shots ahead of second placed.

Murphy’s second round 69 followed a level par opening round and his two rounds will put him in good stead for tomorrow’s opening matchplay phase.  Ireland face Switzerland in the morning with second place Iceland facing Slovakia in the other semi-final.

The winner and runner-up teams of Divison 2 will be promoted to the European Boys’ Team Championship, which will be played at La Manga Club, Spain, in 2017.  Murphy will partner Kilkenny’s Mark Power  in the first of the two foursomes pairs, and the afternoon will see five singles matches being played to decide who goes trough to the semi-final.

In Flight B, Estonia is straight through to the semi-final owing to its fifth place in the qualification. Its opponent will be decided in the morning’s quarter-finals: Hungary vs. Croatia and Turkey vs. Poland. The matches in Flight B will consist of one foursomes match and four singles matches.