Cheshire has enjoyed a magnificent year of success at all team and individual levels and once again the Cheshire Senior Ladies excelled under the captaincy of Jane Burke (Sandiway GC).
Jane is standing down from the role and handing over to Tiff Fielden (Hale GC).
Jane outlined the highlights of her years: “Taking over last year as senior captain, I was in equal measures delighted and terrified, as our team is a collection of pretty awesome, highly tuned, dedicated athletes for whom winning is the norm. “That said, senior golf is all about friendship and our team has made it a wonderful year for me and it will be for Tiff in 2026.
“I’ll take you through the year as it happened. Our highly tuned senior athletes sleep in the winter. “They regroup in spring, so we all came together in our lovely new uniforms to play two warm up matches against the senior men and the Cheshire A team, both of which we won, and a joint game with the juniors where we mixed teams and played for chocolate eggs.
“Fourteen ladies played in these matches from 10 different clubs and we welcomed old friends such as Elaine Ratcliffe who hadn’t played in the Cheshire colours for nearly 25 years
“The year started fully with the Seniors’ Championship which was played at Sandiway Golf Club at the end of April. The gross qualifying trophy was won by Barbara Laird. Our 2025 champion was Catherine Rawthore, who won over Sarah Naden on the 19th hole.
“In May Sarah Naden won the English Senior Women’s Amateur Championship at the Nottinghamshire course and Barbara Jamieson reached the last eight.
”Closely following this championship, the seniors were back at Sandiway competing in the Northern Vets Senior Championship. Lisa Chrimes won for Lancashire beating Lynn Wass of Yorkshire in the final. Caroline Berry was runner up in the second flight. Cheshire’s Julie Matthews won the best nett qualifier.
“Then came the Richardson Trophy matches. The trophy is fought amongst the counties of Cheshire, Yorkshire, Lancashire, Durham, Northumberland and Cumbria. It began in 1937 and Cheshire has held the trophy since 2016, the longest time any county has won consecutively. No pressure then!
“The first match against Durham was played on the 5th of June at Sandiway. Cheshire won 5 of the games and halved 2. Score 6/1
“The second match, again at home, was against Northumberland June and resulted on a clean sweep. Cheshire winning 7-0.
”Our third match was away against the mighty Yorkshire at Wakefield anwee came away victorious 4/3
“Feeling confident we came back to Sandiway to face Lancashire. Lancashire have a very strong team and have been undefeated for over a year. Sadly for us they maintained their record and beat us 4.5-2.5.
“The best players in the North of England are then selected to play in the Jamboree which this year was hosted by Scotland at Barassie GC, Troon. Catherine Rawthore, Sara Spencer, Barbara Jamieson and
Sarah Naden were selected to play although sadly Sarah withdrew as she was injured. “The Northern team, lead by Cheshire’s Caroline Berry, came joint second losing to a strong Scottish side.
“Back to our Richardson journey, the last match against Cumbria was at Seascale on the 12th of August.
”Our statisticians had worked out that to take the trophy we had to win at least 6-1 and Yorkshire had to win four three or draw with Lancashire.
“On a blustery day we came away victorious six, one. A great win.
“Then it was just down to Yorkshire, I don’t think any of us really thought we would do it. Yorkshire came through for us in the end and amazingly drew, so we had four points and Lancashire had four points but due to the fantastic depth of our players we had won four more games so we won the trophy for a record ninth consecutive Year.
“In these matches we had 11 players representing Cheshire. Cath Rawthore, Sara Spencer, Caroline Berry and Jane Burke played all matches; Barbara Jamieson played four; Ali Hunt and Jill Peters (who achieved their colours this year) played three; Wad Grayson two; and Barbara Laird, Ali Bluck and Elaine Ratcliffe, one.
“Every game counted and my congratulations go to all of them, a fabulously committed team.
“Two players represented England, Sarah Naden and Catherine Rawthore in the European Senior Women’s Team Championship at the Pula GC in Majorca significantly contributing to a great win. Both players also represented England in the home internationals in Dorset
“For our last fixture of the year, I return to my theme of friendship. 14 golfers from Cheshire, Yorkshire and Lancashire came together at Presbury to celebrate Gill’s day in memory of our dear friend Gill Mellor- a great day of fun laughter and memories.
“It has been a privilege and an honour to captain our team this year and I want to thank all who played, helped us and supported us including our senior President, Nancy Lane.
“I enjoyed my year, it has been wonderful to be part of such a great group of highly tuned athletes and friends.”
Pic (top) Jane with Caroline Berry and the Richardson Trophy
Copy and images: Geoff Garnett
