Nairobi — The 2008 golf season will begin this weekend at Muthaiga Golf Club with the annual Nairobi District Foursomes tournament sponsored by Musimba Investments Limited.

The two-day inter-club matchplay foursomes tournament has attracted teams from all clubs in the greater Nairobi region as well as Kiambu and Thika.

All clubs with 18-hole courses, save for defending champions Thika, will field two teams each while the small clubs (nine-holes) will be represented by one team each.

Clubs with two teams each are Karen, Sigona, Limuru, Royal, Windsor and hosts Muthaiga.

During last year's tournament, Thika's Simon Ngige and youngster Nelson Mudanyi beat the Royal 'B' team of Josiah Kogo and Avnish Bhandari 3-1.

The also beat the Karen 'A' side of J.M. Smith and Simon Houghton 3-2 and Muthaiga 'B' 1-up to qualify for the final, where they beat Muthaiga's 'A' team of Nicholas Rokoine and Greg Snow at the 20th hole to claim the title.

This year, Ngige has teamed up with David Wakhu, who will open their title defence against Kiambu's David Ndirangu and Ben Njuguna in the last match of the opening round on Saturday morning.

Rokoine is now a professional and no longer qualifies to play in the event while Snow, the winner of the Golfer Of The Year 2007 Award, is currently away in the United States, where he represented Kenya in the World Junior Championship.

The Muthaiga 'A' team this year will be made up of former national team captain Kumar Dhall and former Muthaiga chairman Ashwin Gidoomal while the 'B' team will have Paul Thuo and Massimo Vinaccia. Muthaiga 'A' take on Karen 'B' made up of Craig Nielson and Simon Houghton.

Being at home, Muthaiga teams start as hot favourites, though the two teams are likely to face a stiff competition from Thika's Ngige and Wakhu, Vet Lab's Lee Njoroge and Ganeev Giddie, Royal Nairobi's Ken Abuto and Mugambi Murwithania and the Alibhai brothers Farsheed and Nadeem of Windsor.