HAMPSHIRE golfer Scott Gregory has taken the plunge and turned professional just a week after playing for Great Britain & Ireland in the Walker Cup (writes Andrew Griffin).

Corhampton member Gregory, who received an 11th hour invitation to play in this week’s Portuguese Masters, a European Tour event, spent last weekend weighing up his options.

Other members of the GB&I team who turned pro after the Walker Cup, including Gregory’s former Hampshire Boys team-mate, Jack Singh-Brar, had already lined up a start at the Dom Pedro Victoria Golf Course in Vilamoura.

Singh-Brar has signed for the company formed by One Direction pop star Niall Horan, and backed by Rory McIlroy.

No such deal has so far materialised for a number of the other players, including Gregory, despite him having won the Amateur Championship last year, earning him entry to the 2017 Masters, US Open and Open Championship.

The cost of playing professional golf on tour runs to thousands of pounds a week and without a tour card, Gregory will have to rely on more invitations, or achieve a top-10 finish to earn an automatic start.

Because of his world amateur ranking – seventh going into the Walker Cup – Gregory has earned an exemption through stage one of the European Tour Qualifying School which started last week.

• Liphook’s Sam Hutsby, who has been battling to regain his tour card via the Challenge Tour, took second spot at The Roxburghe in the Scottish Borders last week,

• Rowlands Castle pair Tom Robson and Billy McKenzie won the Hampshire Foursomes by a massive six shots at Corhampton on Sunday.

Having opened up with a two-over par 73 in the morning – one behind the halfway leaders – they roared out after lunch with a run of five birdies on the front nine.

And while they could not quite reproduce those fireworks on the back nine, they eagled the 10th to leave the rest of the field trailing.

Their only dropped shot of the day came at the 403-yard 16th, but they finished in style with a birdie four at the 510-yard 18th to sign for a 63.

County captain Martin Young and Blackmoor’s Colin Roope, recent winner of the Courage Trophy and Hampshire Mid-Amateur Championship, started with a bogey five, but then eagled the par-five seventh and birdied the ninth to go out in two under.

Trailing Robson and McKenzie by four shots, their chance had effectively gone by the time they made a bogey five at the 16th, but got the shot back with a four at the last to take the mid-amateur prize as the leading pair over 35 by eight shots.