Willie Bell Memorial Trophy Rules and Procedures
Last Updated February 2026
1. The rules herein are particular to the Linlithgowshire Golf Association (LGA) Willie Bell Memorial Trophy. Accordingly, they should be read in conjunction with the LGA Generic League Rules.
2. All players must be a Gents member of the club they are representing and have a WHS HI between 6.0 and 24.0 on the 1st day of April immediately preceding the season in question. However, the intent of the Willie Bell Memorial Trophy is to provide friendly team competition for players who do not habitually play in either the LGA Summer League or Seniors League. To help ensure all clubs can field full teams for all matches, and because all games are handicapped in any case, these limits will not be strictly enforced but it is expected that all teams will be selected in this spirit.
3. All matches shall consist of 5 4 Ball Better Ball (4BBB) handicapped matchplay games. (See procedure for calculating strokes received)
4. The Secretary shall draft a fixture list indicating which week matches will be played, normally between June and July. The home team may select which day of the week each match will be played. A change of date due to fixture congestion may be agreed by the Captains of the team concerned BEFORE the league commences and reported to the Secretary. Once the league has commenced, alternative dates may only be arranged where course conditions or an Act of God has caused a match to be postponed. Any team unable to play a match for any other reason will forfeit the match as a walkover.
5. Matches shall commence at 5pm or an alternative time agreed by the Captains.
6. In the event of a player not being ready to play at their start time, the undernoted rules shall apply:
a. If a player presents himself for play within 5 minutes after his start time, his team will lose the first hole.
b. If a player fails to present himself for play within 5 minutes of his start time, his team will lose the game OR his partner may elect to play the match as a single player, starting 1 down at the 2nd tee.
Procedure for Calculating Strokes Received
Scottish Golf has issued new guidelines (effective April 1st 2024) for team match play events where no computer software is in use.
- Using their current WHS Handicap Index, obtain each player’s rounded Course Handicap from the course WHS table. A player’s Playing Handicap is defined as 100% of this rounded Course Handicap.
- For each 4 Ball, the player(s) with the lowest Playing Handicap will receive no strokes and be considered the scratch player(s). Therefore all 4 players’ Playing Handicaps shall be reduced by the lowest Playing Handicap to give their ‘Relative’ Playing Handicap.
- These ‘Relative’ Playing Handicaps should then be multiplied by 90%, then rounded to the nearest whole number, to give the number of strokes received by each player for their 4 Ball.
Example of Calculating Stokes Received
Player A has WHS Handicap Index of 12.2
Player B has WHS Handicap Index of 9.9
Player C has WHS Handicap Index of 7.6
Player D has WHS Handicap Index of 17.5
From the Course Handicap Table, the rounded course handicaps (and therefore the Playing Handicaps) for each player are as follows:
Player A: 15
Player B: 12
Player C: 9
Player D: 21
Player C has the lowest Playing Handicap, so this is subtracted from all the Playing Handicaps to give a ‘Relative’ Playing Handicap for each player as follows:
Player A: 15 – 9 = 6
Player B: 12 – 9 = 3
Player C: 9 – 9 = 0
Player D: 21 – 9 = 12
Finally, the strokes received by each player are calculated by taking 90% of their ‘Relative’ Playing Handicap and rounding as follows:
Player A: 6 * 90% = 5.4, rounded to 5
Player B: 3 * 90% = 2.7, rounded to 3
Player C: 0 * 90% = 0
Player D: 12 * 90% = 10.8, rounded to 11