Dominic Clemons: Amateur aims to make big impression on Open debut

Last month Clemons won the Scottish Amateur title by an incredible 17-shot margin, carding a brilliant 62 in the final round at Muirfield.

But he subsequently fell just short in his attempt to earn entry to the Open by winning the Amateur Championship at Ballyliffin, losing 4&3 to Denmark’s Jacob Skov Olesen in the final under matchplay rules.

Clemons said: “I got to the British Amateur final. The winner of that gets an invite to the Open, the Masters and the US Open. Unfortunately it didn’t go my way but I got another chance in the final qualifying, got to the top of the leaderboard with Justin Rose and managed to get a spot.

“I feel I’m on the rise and getting better and better. It was a great experience and I’m looking forward to playing against him again at Troon. It’s nice to get my first major start before I turn pro and it should be good experience.”

Clemons names England’s Lee Westwood as his favourite player and even if the Open title proves beyond him, there is still the secondary target of matching Rose’s 1998 achievement of winning the leading amateur’s silver medal – which has not been done by an English player since Alfie Plant seven years ago.

“I’m looking forward to showing what I’ve got at Troon,” Clemons said.

“We’ll try and get there a few days early and get a feel for the course. I feel good, I’ve had a lot of links practice the last few weeks and if I play well, I’m sure I’ll be right there.”