Scottish Amateur Golfer of the Year Connor Syme has turned professional and will make his debut at this week’s Portugal Masters at Vilamoura.
The 23-year-old from Drumoig in Fife has a sponsors’ invitation for the European Tour event this week and has signed a management deal with Modest! Golf, the company set up by One Direction star and golf fanatic Niall Horan.
Syme’s last blows as an amateur were as part of the Great Britain and Ireland Walker Cup team two weeks ago. He finishes a glittering amateur career ranked No 8 in the world, with the Australian Amateur title last January the crowning achievement of his time in the unpaid ranks.
This season Syme played in the Open Championship, won the Battle Trophy in Crail and reached the quarter-finals of the US Amateur. He was previously an semi-finalist and medallist in the Amateur Championship, and played for Scotland for three years in teh European Amateur Team Championship, winning it twice.
It had been expected that Syme would spend a further year as an amateur but like many of the defeated GB&I team at Los Angeles Country Club has opted to strike while the iron is hot.
Modest! is a relatively new player on the golf management scene, having promoted some golf events in Horan’s native Ireland including a Challenge Tour event. Their roster of players is mostly promising newcomers to the professional scene, including Syme’s GB&I team-mate Jack Singh Brar and the former South African Amateur champion Thirtson Lawrence.
Horan, taking a sabbatical from One Direction at present, is a self-confessed golf fanatic, and close friend of former World No 1 Rory McIlroy. The Modest! Golf company has grown out of the management stable of the same name in entertainment that represents One Direction, Little Mix and Olly Murs.