Along the coast from the new football epicentre of Dumfries, the Solway Firth has two sporting claims to fame in the shape of golf at the highly rated Southerness course and the rather more eccentric annual flounder trampling contest. In a curious way, the Scottish Boys' Championship has become the event at which the two are combined.

While the favourites have done the trampling when it is held at this venue, so their opponents have done the floundering, Michael Stewart having followed in the footsteps of Scott Henry by crushing all opposition to win the title here. He may not quite have matched Henry's record 12&11 victory in the 2004 final, but there were similarities in the manner of his efforts.

Among a generation of players that is rated very highly, this jaunty 18-year-old from Troon is a natural-born leader, as Saturday's 8&7 beating of Paul Shields, his international team-mate and fellow product of the West Institute of Sport, emphatically demonstrated. While Shields admitted to having tired towards the end of the morning round of the 36-hole final, Stewart's form improved as the week went on and he broke a 14-hole deadlock to hit four successive threes in winning all four holes ahead of lunch.

That particular sequence ended with him playing the 18th hole for only the second time in eight matchplay rounds and he had, remarkably, also produced an eagle on the one previous visit, when seeing off another international team-mate, David Law, the previous evening.

"A couple of putts went in at the right time but, considering how long the week is, being able to play that standard of golf is pleasing," said Stewart.

The way he finished the match off bore further testimony to his class as he first holed what looked like the winning birdie putt from 25 feet at the 28th, only for Shields to show his character by following him in from 18 feet, before Stewart then put it beyond his opponent by sinking a 15-footer for another birdie.

Since he was, at eight under, the only player in the field to break par at the first event of the SGU Junior Tour this season at Kingsbarns a fortnight ago, he has truly stamped his authority on his peers, which he pretty much acknowledged in saying: "It's a really good start to the season and this is the big one for me."

Spencer Henderson, the Scottish Golf Union's national junior coach, explained why he believes that Stewart has emerged as a dominant force and how he believes that will inspire the rest.

"I was down on the range and Michael was the only one on it at certain times," he said, adding that he would not be slow in pointing that out to the others. "Top players tend to do things differently in any sport. It's like Tiger Woods. If you're the best then people look up to you and try to get to that level."

While mention of Woods must be taken properly in context, in one sense Stewart got one over on the world's greatest player last week.

While Woods was struggling to respond to the pressure he put on himself when claiming he could win a grand slam this season, the Scottish teenager could hardly have been more dominant after declaring his plans to emulate Henry by winning this event and the Scottish Boys' Strokeplay Championship in the same season. The second of those events is not until late July, at Blairgowrie's Lansdowne Course, but Stewart can already be installed as a short odds favourite.