Good morning everybody, this blog is being brought to you under a certain amount of duress (all relative of course – I am not starving, homeless or languishing in a cell with my fingernails under threat).  No, it’s just that I’m trying to compose while decomposing, having had my second jab on Wednesday (that fact alone brings home to you just how quickly the years are rushing by) and visited the osteopath yesterday.  As usual, the bits that I thought were tootling along nicely turned out to be locked in unnatural positions and now that they’ve been re-aligned, I’m knackered.  Fit only for a return to the pub, really – inside preferably, given the weather we’ve been having.  Let’s hope the Horse and Jockey’s refurb stays on course – and the dust from the neighbouring demolition stays out of the beer.

You couldn’t tell from the picture above but it’s complete chaos on Sandford Street in Lichfield, just next door to one of the country’s great pubs.

Florida, I have to confess, is not my favourite state but that’s where I’d like to be this weekend, at Seminole, at the Walker Cup, watching the amateurs of GB and I (Great Britain and Ireland) suffer yet another defeat at the hands of the United States.  We usually lose away from home, so that’s not an unreasonable assumption but in reality and against the weight of history I always live in hope and there have been celebrated upsets in the past, so perhaps there’ll be another famous away win this weekend…..

At least the team won’t be hampered by having me taking to the tee.  Earlier in the week, I woke up in a muck sweat because, for some unknown reason, I’d been drafted in at the last minute to play in the Walker Cup at Portstewart, my home course.  I don’t think I ever quite made it to the 1st tee (that’s an anxiety thing usually – in this case it was a relief) because I couldn’t work out why they’d picked me.  Where were the reserves?  Couldn’t they get there in time?  Weren’t there any Irish guys high enough up the list to get there?

Fair enough, it was my home course but I’d never played it from the back tees and would have to play out of my socks even to reach the fairways.  How on earth was I going to avoid losing 10 and 8?  The par 3s were my only chance really and even then it would probably take chipping in a la Dad.  He was lethal around the greens but could I, a not very spiritual being, channel that?  Would blind panic be enough to summon a long forgotten family skill?  Putting like the sainted Inbee might help but I’m still waiting for the videos to be translated…

Proud strikers of the ball though our Walker Cuppers undoubtedly are, chipping like Daddy Madill and putting like Inbee Park, fearsome competitors both, might be just the skills they need to upset the odds at Seminole.  Good luck gentlemen.

These days most Walker Cuppers harbour hopes of being successful professionals and earning lots of money, winning titles, all that sort of good stuff.  Nothing wrong with that, so when everyone starts wondering how much money is too much; when ambition becomes greed; when independent contractors are suddenly no such thing; when proposed super leagues threaten to upset the comfortable status quo….What happens then?

Well, it’s all a bit beyond me, not least because I couldn’t quite grasp the attraction of the premier super-duper league concept, apart from the bank vaults of cash (or will all transactions be in/via bitcoin?) being thrown at potential competitors.  What professional – and assorted advisers – wouldn’t be intrigued?

It just seems a very limited concept to me but judging by their reaction the US PGA Tour and the European Tour are worried.  They probably should be – not too many empires have lasted for a thousand years – and golf is not the same as football, with fans invading Old Trafford.  Who’s going to be storming….where?  Wentworth?  The Belfry?  Quail Hollow?  TPC Sawgrass?  Le Golf National?

This looks like a story that will keep a lot of people exercised for quite a while and even the newspapers are taking an interest.  If you’re a Daily Telegraph reader (I do know a few), Jamie Corrigan will keep you informed and I think Daily Mail readers are lucky enough to have Derek Lawrenson writing about golf still.  The Scots haven’t given up on golf yet and Alistair Tait is asking some pertinent questions on alistairtait.com.

Back to the supposedly ho-hum, lowkey, everyday European Tour, which is doing its best to survive and throws up heartwarming stories time after time.  I love its leaderboards, featuring players from South Africa, Germany, Poland, Finland, name your country and who wouldn’t be moved by the general joy when Dean Burmester ran away with the Tenerife Open (how quaint and old-fashioned, a tournament sponsored by an island) with a last round of 62 at Golf Costa Adeje.

“There’s no words that can describe it,” the South African said of his long-awaited second European win.  “It’s four years of struggle and hard work…I can go home and see my family now, I’m so excited.  This is pretty emotional.”

 

 

 

 

I’ve got the beers in for the Carabao* Cup final on Sunday – that’s the Football League Cup in old money – though I see that the sponsors make “a low calorie fruity energy drink….with half the sugar of Red Bull” (not that that would be difficult – I tried the “gives you wings” tipple once when they sponsored the last six holes at European Tour events and found it undrinkable, more likely to make me stumble than soar).  Still, they seem to be doing OK in Formula One, not the cheapest of sports to fund.

[*A carabao is a “domestic, swamp-type water buffalo” hence the featured picture.  Congrats to anyone who spotted the connection.]

Sitting here writing this, I’m feeling slightly guilty about watching this match at all.  It’s between Manchester City, currently the best team in England, aiming to win this competition (the least important on their list) for the fourth time in a row, apparently and Tottenham Hotspur, my club for more than 50 years, who’ve just sacked their manager Jose Mourinho but are in dire need of a trophy of any sort after years of flattering to deceive.

Worse, both City and Spurs were involved in the European Super League shambles, the excoriated elitist semi breakaway that collapsed before it really started, buried, perhaps temporarily, under a tsunami of scorn, fury, horror, whatever, from fans, governing bodies, government.  I felt ashamed that my lot were involved in something so self-serving that smacked, in our case, of delusions of grandeur but why should I have expected anything else?

Professional sport is all about money, so why be outraged when those who already have a lot – although the pandemic has taken its toll of the pounds and the pennies and the sainted bottom line – want more?  And to hell with everyone else.

Or is it really that simple?  I was never a blonde and am not always dumb but the whole thing is puzzling.  Why make the announcement when they (the dirty dozen intent on super stardom) did?  And then realise that it was so cock-eyed and unpopular (to say the least) that they pulled out right away?  They’re supposedly intelligent, successful businessmen, have they a hidden agenda; is there a cunning plan?  Or did they just completely misjudge the public mood?  They’re so used to making shedloads of money that they’ve forgotten that they can lose it too?   Are all their advisers useless?  Does the owners’ contempt for the fans know no bounds? (Probably not.)  What will the fall-out be?  Is modern sport unsustainable and unaffordable?

Football likes to ride roughshod over most other sports, dominating the telly, radio, whatever newspapers remain, hoovering up the mega sponsorships, paying massive transfer fees and salaries to the select few, maintaining a huge gap between the haves and have-nots.  Moderation in all things?  You’ve got to be kidding.  What planet are you on?

Here I am hyperventilating about football and its inherent greediness and then we hear about the PGA Tour and its Player Impact Program(me), a bonus pool of $40 million for the ten biggest needle-movers, heaven help us.  They will be decided by an Impact Score determined by five criteria (or metrics):  a player’s popularity in Google Search;  his Nielsen Brand Exposure rating (don’t ask); his Q Rating (appeal, apparently);  his MVP Index rating (engagement on social and digital channels); and his Meltwater Mentions (frequency he generates coverage across media platforms).

I’ve copied this from golfchannel.com, who got it from Golfweek I believe and it makes me sick to my stomach, perhaps because it makes me realise that I’m a complete dinosaur, incapable of making sense of the gobbledygook or getting to grips with a concept that exists solely to make exceedingly rich people even richer.  And no doubt their accountants have already worked out how to make sure that their clients pay next-to-no tax – no squeezing them and their PIP “earnings” until the pips squeak.

Based on figures from 2019, we’re talking about Tiger Woods (no one “moves the needle” like he does), Rory McIlroy, Brooks Koepka, Phil Mickelson, Rickie Fowler, Jordan Spieth, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Justin Rose and Adam Scott.  No doubt the PGA Tour will keep us posted as to who is up there in the rankings now – unbeknownst to most of us the PIP started at the beginning of this year.

Rose was asked for his thoughts about it and said:  “…..you do want to incentivise the top players to create content.  It’s very easy for the top players to say no because it doesn’t serve them.  So if you are looking at content creation….that’s where it’s coming down to these days.  So if it serves the fan and if it serves the game of golf…..then it’s probably a good thing for everybody….”

Blimey O’Reilly.  This fan can take no more.  The jig is up.  The pros really have gone beyond me.

Ah well, at least there’s still the game itself and the joy of playing with friends, sometimes for money, mostly not, just the drinks and the bragging rights.

Still on the subject of money, I’ve just read a rather heartening article called Payback Time by Rupert Neate in The Guardian Weekly.  There are, surprisingly, some super-rich people (multi-millionaires and billionaires) who are in favour of a wealth tax to help fund the recovery after the pandemic.  Abigail Disney, the granddaughter of Roy, brother of Walt, has always been, she says, “too rich”.  She is a member of the Patriotic Millionaires movement, a group keen to persuade governments to “raise taxes on people like us.  Immediately.  Substantially.  Permanently.”

Blimey O’Reilly.  Perhaps there is hope after all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s three months and counting since my last venture on to a golf course and, now, with a bit of luck and a fair wind I’ll get a few holes next week.  I’m really looking forward to it – the golf may or may not be up to much but the company will be good and the exercise of walking a few miles up hill and down dale, periodically swinging my arms like a dervish will, I’m sure, be very good for me.  And my attitude will be ideal for once.  It’ll be one of pure gratitude at being out in the wide fresh air and it’s unlikely any little niggles will upset any of us.  After all, it’s not difficult to see the bigger picture when you’ve lived through what we’ve all experienced this last year.

I wonder how long it’ll be, though, before, once again, we start feeling irritated by the minutiae of golf club life and the sometimes seemingly ridiculous behaviors imposed upon us by those who claim to be invested in “upholding the traditions of the club”.  For those of you who use social media, wouldn’t it be a good idea to expand the hashtag, #BeKind, to become your club motto?  And that’s not just being kind to each other and our visitors when we are allowed them but to the course as well.

Ian Poulter was having a rant the other day on twitter about the appalling lack of effort in repairing any pitchmarks on the beautiful Lake Nona greens.  I have seen similar at my own club at Delamere, along with a total disregard for smoothing out footprints in bunkers.  We are blessed with a first-class course maintenance staff, headed by Andy Ralphs, and it surely isn’t too much to ask that we respect their work and our fellow members by looking after the course as well as we can.  Those are the sort of “traditions” with which I wish to be associated.  Let’s try and leave folk feeling better than we found them.

With Ireland having failed to come up to the mark in the Six Nations rugby I’m currently scouring the results of our homegrown players with a view as to who may be the Emerald Isle’s next major winner.  After all, we haven’t won a major since 2019 so it’s high time we annexed another big title, isn’t it?!  I like the way Stephanie Meadow and Leona Maguire are both progressing and Olivia Mehaffey, sixth last week in a Symetra Tour event, will be joining the paid ranks sooner rather than later, as, in all likelihood, will Julie McCarthy.  There are other fine women players waiting in the wings and it’ll be a race between them all to see who will be the first Irish female to attain major success.  I couldn’t quite call it at the moment but I do believe we’ll be enjoying that particular party within the next three years.  Can’t wait.

Rory is slipping a little under the radar at the moment, which will surely sting as he likes to be slap bang in the middle of any conversation about global golf.  I see he has added the redoubtable Pete Cowen to his performance team which should help settle his mind re things technical.  I still would love to see him consult Dave Alred, performance coach extraordinaire, as I feel that could be the key to ending this almost seven-year major drought.  Despite him falling to his lowest world ranking in three years (11th) I am still very confident that Rory has more majors to stack into his locker.

Shane Lowry has shown flickers of some decent form recently and could do with solid performances prior to Augusta if he’s to play well there.  He’s a player who can utterly transform with a bit of confidence flowing through him.  When that happens he’ll certainly be a major contender again and will hopefully join that multi-major Irish club currently only occupied by Harrington and McIlroy.  I suppose at the moment all the Irish top-notchers are slight “works in progress” but golf is nothing if not deliciously unpredictable.

Something else rather unexpected happened this week.  My good pal Sarah Bennett, set to become the captain of the PGA in March next year, ran a half-marathon for charity!

She was running to raise funds for ground-breaking research into thymic cancer, a disease her good friend and avid golf lover Wendy Lodder died from two and a half years ago.  This was not only a great effort but literally mind-blowing for friends like me who have known Sarah for thirty years and who have never seen her so much as run for a bus in the past!  Sarah and I have many reasons to have a special connection, none more binding than being stranded together in Pittsburgh during the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but that is a story for another day.  I’m immensely proud of her for accomplishing this and hope you’ll indulge me in sharing her Just Giving details below.

I am now a bona fide signed-up member of the “Anything’s Possible” club!

Go Sarah!   https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/sarah-bennett111

I have to confess my mind’s not entirely devoted to this week’s blog, not least because I’m multitasking (or attempting to), trying to apply for tickets for the Rugby World Cup in France in 2023 and getting nowhere very, very slowly.  At this rate there’ll be no reason whatsoever to harbour hopes of improving my French – or at least the rugby-related bits, quel essai, allez les verts, that sort of thing – and dredging up the words of the Marseillaise from French class half a century ago.  Gulp.  That long ago?  No, much, much, longer…

Oh well, it’ll all be on the telly and there’s plenty of time to get the beers and some decent wine and food in (not much different from normal then).  I’m currently up from 28% to 40% through the queuing process, not even halfway to the posts, which wouldn’t be so bad if I hadn’t got up to 65%, well on my way to reaching the website, several hours ago, only to be told I wasn’t connected to the internet and had to start again and go to the end of the queue.  There’s not much of a chance of tickets now.  It took no time at all for the first tranche to sell out, to the holders of Mastercards and I was far too slow off the mark then.

There was a time when I wasn’t quite so slow – surely I’ve bored you with my part in Coleraine High School’s magnificent victory in the final of the 4 x 100 senior relay at the (All-Ireland) Irish Schools Athletic Association finals?  I’d bore you even more with the leap of my life – 16 feet 11 1/2 inches in the currency of the day – to become the Ulster Schools’ intermediate long jump champion but all the details are on the iPad and that’s the machine inching its way towards the RWC France 2023 website.

It’s always intrigued me that I jumped two feet further than I’d ever jumped before (and never matched again in an admittedly short long jump ‘career’) mainly because one of the other competitors got so far up my nose that it concentrated the mind wonderfully.  She swanned around asking everyone what their longest jump was, establishing that she was far and away the best of us, the overwhelming favourite.  Then the least of her worries took flight and all bets were off, the contest was over.  I don’t know if my inspiration ever trained on as an athlete but I certainly didn’t.  No Olympics for me – except on the telly.

Pause here because, lo and behold, I’ve reached the head of the queue and even managed to get into the website within the allotted two minutes.  No team packs are currently available and when I checked on the only cities that allowed me in – Lille and Lyon – there was nothing available there either.  Quelle surprise.

Tokyo in 1964 was the first Olympics I remember being aware of and all being well, pandemic permitting, the Games will be back there later this year.  A year late and a little compromised (fewer spectators, bubbles, that sort of thing) but back (fingers crossed).  Golf will be there, for the second time in a row but the world No 1 Dustin Johnson has already said he won’t be going, the gig’s not for him.  He’s not the only one – Webb Simpson has also put himself on the no-show list but with all due respect to Webb, who is currently ranked No 10 in the world, there are quite a few of his fellow countrymen ahead of him in this particular pecking order.  The top 15 in the world will be eligible but there’s a limit of four players from one country in that category.  You could be No 5 in the world but if the four players ahead of you are the same nationality – and deign to go – you’re out.

I confess I’ve changed my mind about golf in the Olympics.  I wasn’t a fan but having seen the delight of Inbee Park and Justin Rose, the gold medallists in Rio, Lydia Ko and Henrik Stenson, who won silver and Shanshan Feng and Matt Kuchar, who battled like crazy to finish third and win bronze, I’m a convert.  Add in the kudos that come from being an Olympic sport in countries that have no great tradition in golf and the joy – not too strong an emotion – that comes from being part of the biggest sporting get-together in the world   and you have something that golf would do well not to lose through an indifference bordering on arrogance.

It’s a pity that there will undoubtedly be a restriction on the number of spectators in Tokyo because the attendance at the golf in Japan would have been off the charts, with the women and the men playing in front of full houses, enthusiastic, knowledgeable and vocal.  The format is still 72-hole strokeplay with no team or mixed component but the aim now must be to keep golf in the Games until the powers-that-be can come up with something more imaginative and appealing.  Rugby 7s are in.  What about Golf 6s?

I’d love to hear Martin Johnson’s take on that – not the towering World Cup-winning England rugby captain – but a Welshman with a Leicester connection (he was once cricket and rugby correspondent at the Leicester Mercury).  A lovely, funny man, the best of company, Martin died last week, aged 71.  He was The Independent’s first cricket correspondent, appointed by Charlie Burgess, the sports editor.  In his obituary, Charlie wrote:  “Readers were astonished and amused – some bemused – by a hilarious, wise-cracking correspondent with a unique style….Some readers were not amused by this fun.  One sent the editor a cutting of one of Martin’s pieces with all the jokes highlighted.  There remained just 20 or so words unmarked……”

Martin couldn’t help himself, he was witty, smart, sharp and a delight to be with.  Dai and I were lucky enough to spend many a happy hour in his company, sometimes in one of Melbourne’s many marvellous restaurants, consuming copious amounts of excellent red wine.  The details are a little hazy but there’s a warm, fuzzy glow about the memories.

Martin once said that his ambition was “never to have to write another word” and in his obit Charlie wrote that Martin had told him, “I don’t think anyone realised that all I really wanted to do was play golf.”

Thanks for the laughs, lovely man and condolences to your family and friends.  I’ll root out something special from the Margaret River or the Barossa in your memory.  Slainte.