Interesting rules question...

[Timberbonce]

My colleague (also a golfer) just mentioned in his comp this weekend one of his playing partners had an interesting occurance and they didn't know the ruling on it:

His ball went close to a hedge and into some leaves, luckily he found it in amongst the fallen leaves and played it. As they all looked up the saw that 2 balls were in the air, he had actually struck 2 balls the second ball was covered from sight by a leaf.

What would be the ruling on this?

 

[Fyldewhite]

Go find his ball and play as it lies.

The second ball is irrelvant as he did not knowingly play a stroke at it so no penalty.

 

[Smiffy]

Go find his ball and play as it lies.

The second ball is irrelvant as he did not knowingly play a stroke at it so no penalty.

Ahh! What if the one he deliberately went to hit wasn't his ball but the other one was. How could you tell the difference after they'd landed?

 

[Timberbonce]

Well thanks for clearing that up smiffy.

 

[viscount17]

as we all always do , he would have properly identified his ball before playing it would he not?