The final of the 121st Women’s Amateur Championship at Portmarnock, near Dublin, Ireland, was always going to be a struggle for American Melanie Green.
Green, 22, of Medina, New York, and a recent University of South Florida alumna, owned a higher Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (53) than her opponent, Scotland’s Lorna McClymont (131), but in all other respects her challenge was significant.
Not only was Green in Ireland – and on the linksland – for the first time, she also was playing an expert in links golf who won the Irish Women’s Amateur Open in 2022 and 2023.
And, it was raining – not heavily but incessantly – conditions that every Scot is well used to playing.
After two rounds of stroke play and six rounds of match play, the prospect of a 36-hole finale was fatiguing just to think about, never mind to engage in.
“What just actually happened? Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. ... This has just been an incredible week. This tournament is pretty old. To have my name on that trophy is ridiculous.”
Melanie Green
That counted for her opponent, too, of course, but there was a crucial difference: Green was carrying her own bag. Yes. Carrying. Not pulling. She didn’t even give herself a break and pull a trolley.
The sages were muttering about this last, self-inflicted disadvantage, and they were feeling vindicated when Green made early errors that contributed to her reaching the ninth tee of the morning round 4-down.
What the doubters didn’t know was that Green is as resilient as they come.
Her coach at South Florida, Erika Brennan, said ahead of the final: “Melanie hit new heights in her senior year because she is a workhorse. It’s so difficult to outwork her, and her mental toughness just kept getting better and better. She improved year over year, so the big stages became less scary, and she stuck with her process without wavering.”
Brennan added: “I think some people see a machine, but she is a real person with real strengths and real challenges.”
They were to prove exceptionally prescient words.
Green won the ninth with a birdie-3 to reduce the deficit whereupon the match turned on its first crucial moment. McClymont missed a 12-foot putt to regain the 4-up advantage at the very next hole, Green holed from 10 feet for a half, and then McClymont gifted the 11th.
The momentum had tilted, and Green was as remorseless as the drizzle, parring her way to the clubhouse to take a 1-up lead at lunch.
The afternoon round went much the same way, with Green stretching her lead to 3-up through 24 holes, and she remained 1-up with five holes to play.
Back-to-back birdies from McClymont, however, plus the sense that Green, who failed to match either par breaker, finally was tiring helped the Scot reverse the score and go 1-up with three to play.
But there was a final twist.
At the par-5 16th, Green made birdie from short of the green. McClymont, in contrast, failed to get up-and-down to match her either there or for par on the 17th.
Green was back to 1-up and sealed the deal with a one-putt birdie at the last.
“What just actually happened?” the champion asked straight after her 2-up triumph. “Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh,” she repeated before letting out a whoop of delight when informed that she was the first American winner of the title since Kelli Kuehne in 1996 (and the 11th in all) in a tournament that dates to 1893.
“This has just been an incredible week,” Green said. “This tournament is pretty old. To have my name on that trophy is ridiculous.”
Of her introduction to links golf, she said: “I like the fact you have to aim 30 yards either way for the ball to go straight on the wind. It’s kind of cool, and it’s been an awesome experience. Ireland has been very good to me, and I wasn’t even going to enter.”
She is playing in next week’s Arnold Palmer Cup at Lahinch, on Ireland’s Atlantic coast, and revealed that one of her opponents, the International team’s Filip Jakubcik from Czechia, had insisted she enter.
“He was, like, ‘You need to play,’ and I’m, like, ‘What is it? I don’t know when that is or where it is.’ I’m glad I came now, and I got a real Irish welcome. Amazing fans. I want to thank every fan. You guys have been awesome.”
Green excitedly lifted the trophy and likely will be even more thrilled when it sinks in that victory comes with invitations to this year’s Amundi Evian Championship and AIG Women’s Open, and next year’s Augusta National Women’s Amateur, Chevron Championship and U.S. Women’s Open.
McClymont’s spirited effort was another reminder that the University of Stirling remains the U.K.’s only significant alternative to U.S. colleges. Six of her fellow quarterfinalists have been through the latter system, and a seventh is heading there at the end of the summer.
Her coach at Stirling, 2025 GB&I Walker Cup captain Dean Robertson, said: “Lorna graduates this year, and having played on three Arnold Palmer Cup teams is ready to step up to the next levels of the game.”
McClymont also was closely observed by Catriona Matthew, herself a Stirling graduate and this summer’s Curtis Cup captain. Furthering her claims for selection for the match on August 30-September 1 at Sunningdale should be some consolation.
RESULTS
Matt Cooper