This time last week I was looking forward to a very rare, free weekend at home.  My intentions were to put my feet up and watch a bit of sport on the telly.  The rugby was on, but, alas, not Ireland versus Italy – postponed because of the coronavirus situation.  Not to worry, I’d settle down to watch the European Tour golf from Qatar followed by Arnie’s tournament at Bay Hill.

First up, Qatar, which climaxed in a riveting five hole play-off between Spaniard Jorge Campillo, who won in Morocco last year, and 44-year old Scotsman David Drysdale, who was seeking his first European Tour win.  Not knowing either of the protagonists I found myself rooting for Drysdale who was playing in his 498th European Tour event and still doing everything he could to ascend to the top spot on the podium.  His wife Vicki was on the bag, looking calmness personified, even when Campillo holed a couple of outrageous putts to keep himself in it.  Alas for the Scot it was not to be, despite near flawless play in the play-off.  Sometimes if someone else’s name is on the trophy (or cheque) there’s not a thing you can do about it.

My second helping of golf was watching Tyrrell Hatton win for the first time in America around an extremely tough Bay Hill golf course with a frisky breeze and greens like glass.  I watched his final nine holes as, true to form, he harrumphed his way round, kicking petulantly at divots and grumbling away at himself.  He doubled the 11th hole and along with many other viewers I waited for the explosion that would finish him.  It never came.  He ground out seven magnificent pars to squeeze home by a shot from the popular Aussie, Marc Leishman.

So, all told on Sunday I watched about three hours’ worth of golf, and very enjoyable it was too.  I didn’t watch any golf from Thursday to Saturday so I only saw a fraction of the overall output, which must have been up around the 40-hour mark.  I’m mostly only interested and energised by the denouement of tournaments and I put that down to the sheer volume of televised golf thrown at us.  Frankly we are oversaturated with golf on the box and a large proportion of it is simply boring.

I find myself tuning in to the final nine holes on a Sunday now and nothing else.  I am someone who just loves this game but the increase in golf on television makes it so difficult for the broadcasters to bring anything new and fresh and I often wonder if other golf fans find themselves surfing past the golf output with their remotes on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays?  Or perhaps it is just me?

On Monday of this week there came news that both the PGA and LPGA tours in the States had finalised their new broadcast deals from 2021 onwards.  Rick Anderson, chief media officer for the PGA Tour said, “One of the things we are really trying to do here over the next several years is to expand the amount of content we produce.”  He continued, “Think of a tournament where approximately 30,000 shots are hit.  Today, with all we do, we’re still capturing just 30 percent of the shots.”  When I read that my heart sank.  I suspect the eventual aim is to show every shot at every tournament on some media platform or other.  In fact, every shot of every competitor will be available at this week’s Players’ Championship.  Ugh!

The argument is that with the ever expanding and increasing media landscape all sorts of content is required to satisfy the various platforms.  My feeling is that it is people who are already fans who browse and use these various platforms.  We are not capturing or engaging new or non-golfing fans.  And maybe the saturated output will start to turn off lifelong fans like me.  Of course, we are talking absolutely mega money here, so perhaps all really IS well with the global golf world?  Hmm, I wonder.  Alienate grass roots fans and fail to secure new ones and over time that won’t be good news for our sport.

On a lighter note,  I’ve managed to fit in a couple of fun things myself this week.  I managed a couple of rounds and a few visits to the range although not, I confess, bedecked in the shirt sleeves of the television golf world.  On Wednesday I had one of my regular fours at the lovely Vale of Llangollen, amazingly unsquelchy after the endless rain we’ve suffered.  More power to the green staff for producing good greens in early March.

Then yesterday I eschewed the opportunity to watch the first round of The Players’ Championship and headed instead to Dunham Forest Golf & Country Club for an evening of fun and fashion organised by and for the ladies and ably compered by their incomparable club professional, Paul Dennis.  What a feast of fashion sashayed down the catwalk!  All the models were members of the club and the outfits gave a welcome hint of long summer days to come. 

There was a raffle after the catwalk magnificence and when I was asked to draw out a ticket I obliged by drawing out my own!  I was early enough in the draw to acquire the most sought after prize of the entire evening, as seen in the picture below – a coveted, and much sought after…………….loo roll!  The perfect end to a perfect evening!

 

 

 

Money is very important, particularly if you haven’t got any – and it’s probably also really, really important if you’ve got a lot of it but these days I no longer pay much attention to the money on offer at golf tournaments.  Shedloads.  That’s the shorthand.  Lots.  (I’m talking about the main men’s tours, especially the US PGA Tour.)  It’s a bit like top, top footballers – two tops seem to be the minimum these days – whose earnings are so off the charts that one can only wonder how many Lamborghinis one person can drive or how many pairs of ripped jeans or cashmere beanies one man can wear.

It’s another world.  And a consumer society does need consumers after all.  At a vastly lower level, admittedly, I confess I’m also doing my best to keep the economy moving.  I’ve splashed out on a new telly, having consigned my last model, a cast-off for which I was very grateful, to a charity shop.  I’ve also just signed up to Sky Sports for the next three months – £20 per month via NOW TV – and it’s beginning to look as though there’ll be hardly any live sport on offer as events are postponed or cancelled or moved behind closed doors.  Any chance of my money back?

If you’re a professional player, golf, or whatever it is you play, is your job, so the money is important to you.  It’s your livelihood after all, not just a game – not a game at all, probably.  So the top, top golfers will undoubtedly be inclined to think that bigger and bigger purses will mean that things are getting better and better.  And bigger purses are just what they’re going to get after the PGA Tour announced “landmark domestic media rights deals” with ViacomCBS, Comcast/NBC Sports Group, Disney and ESPN+.

No numbers were disclosed but Jay Monahan, the commissioner, said, “We were extremely pleased with the interest we received from the market….The nine-year deals [from 2022-2030] will put us in a position to significantly increase player earnings, deliver more value to our tournaments and sponsors and ultimately allow us to continue to grow our charitable footprint.  Additionally, we are now able to reinvest in our sport in a way never before possible, including production, personnel and technology and are well positioned to best serve and grow our fanbase in the years to come.”

The proposed Premier League Golf project, not welcomed by the tours, who are unsurprisingly in favour of the status quo, also seems to be about more money for the few and I’m not convinced that’s the best thing for the game in general.  All in all, I’m agin a massive gap between the rich and the rest.  And while we’re on this subject:  why do the poor have to be always with us?…..

This train of thought all stemmed from watching the Arnold Palmer Invitational last week.  Conditions on the last day at Bay Hill were so tough as to be almost brutal and unlike some other viewers I was captivated; it was compelling stuff, watching some of the best players in the world coping (or not) with conditions they rarely encounter.  They were having to play proper golf, not an outdoor version of darts.  Marc Leishman, an affable Australian who is a very, very good player, holed a sizeable putt for a par 4 at the last to finish second on his own.  It earned him a million dollars.

A million dollars.  Blimey.  I really hadn’t been paying attention, had I?  One million.  For coming second.  No wonder players keep working away, plodding on when, years ago, they’d have moved on and earned their living somewhere else.  Now, if you can reach the right level, the money’s so good, you don’t have to win too often to be more than comfortably off.

I don’t know how much Tyrrell Hatton made for winning – my head was spinning at the thought of a million for second – but he’s now 22nd in the world rankings and that’s a bit of a money-spinner in itself  He also earned himself a precious red cardi and a couple of years exemption on the world’s most lucrative tour, so he should be made for life as long as he keeps his victory celebrations within bounds…..

I played nine holes at Whittington Heath last Friday and won £1, so I’m very grateful that my state pension kicked in on the same day.  If I’d been a drinker of water throughout my life, I’d have been a much richer woman but I like to think of The Wine Society, a not-for-profit organisation, as a good cause and I’m sure that Harry Vardon, winner of six Opens and one US Open, once told a woman from the Temperance Society that he’d never been beaten by a teetotaller….

I think the first prize this week at the Players Championship at Sawgrass is $2.7 million, the biggest purse in PGA Tour history but the atmosphere will be a bit muted because there’ll be no spectators from today onwards – coronavirus precautions.  They’ll probably allow the telly cameras in to record proceedings, not least because, as Bobby Jones said, there’s not much point performing great deeds if there’s no one there to report it.  And it’s not nearly as much fun if there’s no one there to applaud.

Anyway, on a more domestic level, you’ll be glad to hear that now that my floor seems to be sorted, the boiler has started leaking, so who knows whether I’ll be around to blog again next week.  Life’s a gas.

I include this pic because it always makes me smile.  Bill, a fellow member of the AGW and a very good golfer, died a week ago.  He knew golf inside out – instruction was his forte – and he was the inspiration behind Today’s Golfer magazine.  Condolences to his family and friends.