Benjamin Poke is the highest seed remaining in the Andalucía Costa del Sol Match Play 9 after progressing through three nine-hole matches on Day Three to book his place in Sunday’s quarter-finals.
The Dane, who is the number four seed in the tournament, saw off Filip Mruzek, Dale Whitnell and finally Matthew Jordan at Valle Romano Golf to set up a meeting with countryman Rasmus Højgaard in Sunday’s quarter-final.
The third day saw the format switch from stroke play to match play as Rounds of 64, 32, and 16 were contested until there were only eight players left in the tournament ahead of the final day.
Poke missed the first two cuts of the season but has been ever-present at the weekend in each of his ensuing events and he believes the competitive nature of the close-knit group of Denmark natives on the European Challenge Tour spurs him on to succeed.
“The Danish guys playing well this year absolutely helps me,” he said. “We’re a tight-knit group, us Danes, and we spur each other on and it’s really great.
“When you see the other guys doing well, you obviously want to get going yourself. You think ‘if he can do it, then I can do it as well’.”
Poke was seeded fourth after the stroke play section of the Match Play 9 thanks to rounds of 71-67, two rounds which filled the 27-year-old with confidence ahead of the weekend.
“Playing well in the stroke play gives you a lot of confidence because you know you’re playing the course well and you’re having a decent week on the greens,” he said.
“It all helps to build that bit of momentum going into the match play and when you reach the match play, in principle it doesn’t matter how you get in but that momentum and that confidence is really important. It definitely helped playing so well on the first two days.
“Match play is good, it’s really good. However, the strategy for me is much the same. I just take it one shot at a time and in that way, I’ve got my own plan. If I stick to that and do that well then it will be good.
“Once you reach match play, you’ve got nothing to lose really and that was the mindset today. I just wanted to go out and enjoy it. I played nicely and made a couple of key putts here and there.”
Joining Poke and Højgaard in the quarter-finals is Norway’s Eirik Tage Johansen, who will face Connor Syme for a place in the semi-finals, while Carlos Pigem, the only remaining Spaniard, will face Robin Sciot-Siegrist.
The Frenchman’s countryman Ugo Coussaud will tee it up in the first game of the day against England’s Chris Hanson, with the duo beginning the final day at 8.00am local time.
