Rules / Bunkers

Regarding a doubles matchplay comp I played in this week. My parteners ball came to rest in the same bunker as one of the opposition players.

The opposing player said to my partener this is your ball, unfortunatley they were both playing with titleist 3 balls, please note they had marked theire respective balls at the start of the match although this was not instantly visible at the time as they were both in the same sand trap. Any way, my partener played the ball as inicated as being his by the opposing player, when the oposing player set up to play his shot he then realised the ball he was addressing was not his and was in fact my parteners ball.

could any body advise of what the ruling should be in this instance.

regards

I'm not an expert on rules but I believe the USGA ruling would be that you would get a penalty stroke if you hit someone else's ball.

Pretty sure that the last rules revision allowed you to identify a ball in a bunker, therefore if your partner played the wrong ball it was his responsibility and he'd either get a 2 stroke penalty or lose the hole depending on the format.

Previously there was no pen for playing the wrong ball from the sand as you weren't allowed (for instance) to brush away covering sand to check whether it was yours.

Rule 12 I think off the top of my head.

Yep. New rules allow ID'ing a ball in a hazard. Therefore, your partner takes a penalty for playing a wrong ball.

Agree with LP here.

Players now (since the new 2008 rules were intro'd) must ID their ball before playing it from a hazard.

If you are unsure a ball in a bunker is yours because it is buried and your ID markings are not clearly evident, you are allowed to mark the ball (advising your marker or opponent of what you are going to do ahead of time), clear away as much sand as is required to ID the ball, you must then attempt to recreate your lie as best you can, then go ahead and play your shot.

The fact that your opponent advised your partner which ball was which is pretty much irrelevant, the onus rests with the player to ID his own ball.

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