Blackmoor Golf Club will spend the next few months planning their celebrations for next year’s 50th Selborne Salver – with the record held by member Mark Burgess as the host club’s only-ever winner surviving another year.

Last week, Worcestershire player Alex Emms produced a blistering 65 in the afternoon to catch former England junior Max Hopkins, who was looking to make his own piece of history at the Whitehill club.

Only eight players have won both the Selborne Salver and Hampshire Hog.

Hopkins was bidding to become just the ninth player to win both titles in half a century – having claimed the Hog four years ago. The last to do so was Jordan Smith after his Hog win in 2014, a year after he claimed the silverware at Blackmoor.

Hopkins, from Hertfordshire, opened with a 65 to share the lead with Lancashire’s Zain Wild – Emms was two shots adrift after the morning round.

With the course in immaculate condition after such a wet winter, and head greenkeeper James Norris’ work in preparing the greens attracting widespread adulation, nine players matched or broke the par of 69 in the afternoon – after eight players shot lower than 70 in the morning.

Emms, who opened with five birdies and three bogeys, set the pace after lunch having started on the first in his second round.

Three birdies in four holes before the turn, having picked up a shot at the first, saw Emms leap to the top of the leaderboard, as Wild played the front nine in level-par, while Hopkins dropped a couple of shots.

Emms was the first of the early pacesetters to post his 36-hole total having dropped a shot at the difficult tenth, but finished strongly with back-to-back birdies at 16 and 17, to get to seven-under, only to finish with a five after missing his 12-foot birdie putt on the notorious sloping green and then missing the return for par.

With only four groups left out on the course, Lincolnshire’s Jack Diment threatened to steal the show with a sparkling 64, comprising six birdies and just one bogey having started from the tenth.

But the 30-year-old, from Belton Park GC, needed to birdie three of the last four holes on the front nine to force a play-off and could only par his way in.

Having finished third last year, and now second, the assistant manager at Rutland’s Luffenham Heath GC will be hoping to go one better for next year’s 50th celebrations.

Royal Birkdale’s Greg Holmes, another regular visitor, was edged out of third on countback after an excellent 66 to go with a first round 69, while Hopkins carded 70 to end up in fourth.

Emms was celebrating again 24 hours later, as he wrapped up the Hampshire Salver for the best 72-hole aggregate thanks to a share of 12th at the Fleet golf club.

The plus-four handicapper became the 17th player to win the Selborne and Hampshire Salvers in the same weekend since Peter McEvoy won the first 72-hole prize back in 1979.

Emms said: “This was my third Salver, so I'm delighted to have won.

“It's a great course and you do have to hit it in the right place. I generally drive it well, and apart from the last, my putting was pretty good.”

By Andrew Griffin