I’ve been doing a bit of digging into the history of women’s golf over the past couple of days – for reasons which will become apparent.  I must say it’s very easy to lose yourself in the tales of the wonderful pioneering women who decided they weren’t going to allow men to sideline them from one of life’s great pastimes.

According to Malcolm Crane in his lovely book, “The Story of Ladies’ Golf”, the earliest recorded incidence of a golf competition was one for the local fishwives at Musselburgh in 1810.  This was a surprise to me.  It was startlingly early – a good half century plus before the formation of women’s clubs and unions in Great Britain and Ireland began to be common. Golf continued to flourish north of Hadrian’s Wall but it took the formidable Issette Pearson to really drive the game forward by founding and running the Ladies’ Golf Union in 1893, the same year that the Women’s Amateur was first played.

National championships were organised and the tentacles of the game spread globally with other countries following Issette’s LGU blueprint and adopting the same handicap system.  By the early part of the 20th century there was a place in the game for everyone – from hacker to champion, many of the latter beginning to cross the Atlantic to take on the best from afar.

The Great War changed many things.  Legions of young men never came home and women filled their places by taking on jobs that hitherto had been closed to them.  Life was changing and golf was, understandably, in a decline.

Life goes on, however, and by the early 1920s golf, and particularly women’s golf, was on the up again.  International travel and matches were resumed and flourished and it was into this landscape that a new fixture was introduced – the Roehampton Gold Cup.

Amazingly, next weekend sees the centenary of this great competition and  I know that the club is pulling out all the stops to make it a blockbuster of an event.  My history-delving exercise was my attempt to bring to you a flavour of the times in which this competition started.  But I have a better idea…….

Caroline Scallon, a great friend of the blog and a long-time member and former lady captain of Roehampton, has had a life in golf that has taken her all round the world.  Homes in England, Malta, Virginia, Rhodesia, Zaire, Israel, South Africa and Germany, to name but a few (not all at the same time!) introduced her to all sorts of golf courses and all sorts of golfers.  Her own prowess in the game (a 3 handicap Surrey County player) and numerous England Golf administrative posts make her the ideal person to provide us with some history of this very special event so I had one of my better ideas and asked her to pen a few words.

Here’s what she had to say.

The Roehampton Gold Cup at one hundred is an eye-catching milestone.   It is unique!

Founded by the Miller brothers in 1901, Roehampton Club in south-west London began as a tennis, croquet and polo club.  It did not take too many years before they realised that they had the space and the demand for a golf course.  The inaugural Ladies’ Gold Scratch Challenge Cup was held on March 17^th, 1926, entry fee 2/6d.   So began The Gold Cup, becoming so prestigious that all aspiring lady golfers were drawn to this fixture early in the season.  Handicap limit 9.

And so has it continued, drawing players from all over the British Isles to this southern venue, the course having a reputation for being in first-class condition for the time of year.

To survive The Gold Cup has had to adapt, and adapt it has!    It swiftly became a 36-hole scratch competition.  In the early 1980s the women’s professional tour was launched.  Could The Gold Cup allow professionals to play alongside their friends who remained amateurs?   By 1987 the event was declared Open, professionals included, making up about one third of the field.   With life becoming a seven-day week, and to accommodate those who worked, The Gold Cup swiftly moved to a Saturday (unheard of for women’s golf!).   Choosing one’s playing partners has also remained popular, with many similar events becoming drawn for partners, thanks to one or two found wanting in the ‘score-recording department’.

Since 1926 the list of winners – not to mention the competitors – reads like a Who’s Who of ladies’ golf in the British Isles.   To name a few: Molly Gourlay, Enid Wilson, Pam Barton, Jeanne Bisgood (three times), Marley Spearman, Angela Bonallack, Angela Uzielli, Ann Irvin (six times), Cathy Panton, Catriona Matthew and Georgia Hall, as an amateur in 2012.  The next amateur to win was Ella Butteriss, from Beaconsfield, last year and she will defend her title next week, on the 11th of April.  The only Roehampton member to have won is Carol Archer (1964), now a member at Liphook and the oldest surviving winner is Belle Robertson.  The Scot, whose list of honours would take up an entire blog or more, won in 1978, 1979, 1981 and 1982 and will be at Roehampton to celebrate her 90^th birthday with us  – she was born on the 11th of April 1936.

For the last twenty years the event has been extremely fortunate to have had sponsorship from Russell-Cooke Solicitors thus enabling the club to give generous prizes to the top three professionals and six amateurs.

As Caroline points out the current, very proud holder of the Gold Cup is Ella Butteriss who is featured in the picture at the top of the piece.  What an illustrious list of champions she has joined and what an honour to defend the trophy in its centenary.

This is a truly remarkable achievement by a golf club and I wish them a joyful celebration next weekend.  Congratulations all round, thanks to Caroline for her terrific input and may the sun shine on all the competitors.  I do recall it snowed when I played………….but I just loved it.

It’s very special.

 

Contrary to what some people think – and what it may look like – a certain amount of thought often goes in to this blog.  I have to confess, however, that the only sure thing about this week’s was the featured pic – and since that often depends on everything running smoothly from a technical standpoint, it’s no given.

The photo is of a lovely magnolia in the park just across the road from me and it takes centre stage because it means that spring has sprung and its time has come.  It could be a very short time because, beautiful as they are, magnolias don’t last long and it’s still chilly enough for them to be living on borrowed time.  We’ve got to enjoy them and marvel while we can.

The clocks have changed but it’s too early to ditch the winter woollies so that can mean only one thing:  the cricket season is about to start here in England, with the county championships beginning today (Friday).  Warwickshire are playing Surrey at Edgbaston and a friend and I are hoping to go on Sunday, weather – and play (sometimes four-day matches don’t go beyond two days let alone last the distance) – permitting.

I’m intending to drive us to the ground and hope it’ll be more successful than my last effort when I picked up a fine for driving in a bus lane that was a no-go area for us ordinary motorists.  Oops.  Fingers crossed we get things right this time.

The IPL – Indian Premier League – has just started and it’s the high-class smash-bang-wallop 20-over stuff (if that’s not a complete contradiction!).  Whatever you think of the brutal short form of the game, the level of skill – batting, bowling, fielding – is mind-boggling and once you start watching, it’s impossible to take your eyes off it.

I decided to follow Dad’s lead – he had a football team in every division in England, Scotland and Ireland, to ensure that he had an interest at every level (Sunderland remained his first love wherever they found themselves) – and pick a side.  “What’s the most northerly team?” I asked a mate who knows about these things – and many others, though, like most of us, he’s not infallible.  For instance, he didn’t know that Jack Nicklaus won the Masters in 1986 but I digress – and, of course, he does now.  “Punjab Kings,” came the instant reply.  Right.

“We” (that indicates a tentative we) were at home to the Gujarat Titans, whose uniform was infinitely classier than “our” red and blue mess with gaudy gold numbers and I was tempted to switch allegiance should the Titans win.  However, they didn’t.  So I’m now cheering for the Kings come what may!  We’re away to the Chennai Super Kings today, so at least my knowledge of Indian geography should improve as I scrabble for my one remaining atlas – a Peters one dating from 1989, so it could be time for an update.  Chennai was probably still called Madras then.  Wonder if I have room in the house for a globe…

On the golf front, we played the Coronation Foursomes on Tuesday and my weather app (the Met Office) indicated that it was going to chuck it down with rain early on and be quite cold.  I rugged up accordingly:  thick winter leggings (which were in the pile to go in to summer storage), waterproof troos, lots of layers on top, woolly hat.  It didn’t rain, the sun came out and I was so warm that I had to take off a mid layer to avoid melting away altogether.  My partner and I came third despite making a bit of a mess of the last two holes and, wonder of wonders, we didn’t blob a single hole.

Going back to India – and up a few levels in golf – Alex Fitzpatrick, younger brother of Matt, US Open champion in 2022, won the Hero Indian Open at DLF Golf & Country Club, just outside New Delhi, his first victory on the DP World Tour.  What made it even more special was that Matt had won the Valspar Championship in Florida the week before.  Apparently it was the first time that brothers had won back to back on the two tours.

“It can be hard sometimes when you’re constantly chasing someone’s accolades,” Alex said, “but luckily it’s my brother so it’s not horrific.  I idolise him and I’m just trying to be like him in every way.  It’s been a good week for the Fitzpatricks.”

With a bit of luck Maureen was about ten when she saw sense and gave up idolising her big sister, having already recognised the feet of clay.  Perhaps Matthew F can cope with all that goes with being an idol…I certainly can’t/couldn’t.  Yikes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have you noticed you simply can’t believe a word you hear, see or read nowadays?

No, not a single thing.  From fake news to the erratic, varying, misleading and contradictory statements emanating from across the Atlantic to……well, to the Madill golf blog.  Yep.  Mea culpa.

Last week I waxed lyrical (well, I hope it was lyrical) about my lovely time at Kooyonga golf club in Australia way back in the seventies when I was on the GB team selected to play in the Commonwealth tournament.  It was a fabulous trip (true);  I met and made lifelong friends (also true);  the venue was superb (again true) and the tournament was played at Kooyonga golf club in Adelaide.  Alas, that last fact is, well, not a fact at all.

My very own personal edition of BBC Verify, namely Gillian Stewart, who was on that team, texted when she’d read the piece.

“Blog fact check!  The Commonwealth tournament was played at Lake Karrinyup in Perth.  We then went on to Royal Adelaide where we played in the Australian Ladies’ Open.  You been on the gin?”

I don’t know if this is all made worse by the fact that I HADN’T been on the gin, or on anything at all, but I did feel slightly better when Gill’s next text read, “Well, it was 47 years ago.”

So, apologies all round – particularly to Kooyonga and Lake Karrinyup.  I got my two special Ks mixed up.  I actually played Kooyonga as a professional some years later and it just goes to prove that time frames can shrink to nothing and become blurred the further away you get from them.  Ah well.

I can’t leave the topic of Australia without lauding that country’s current leading female professional, Perth-born Hannah Green.  Hannah has just won the Australian WPGA Championship, her third victory in her last three outings.  She won in Singapore and then travelled home to Oz and tucked away two more wins – such an enormously difficult thing to do for any athlete competing on home turf.  The attendant pressures from carrying the hopes of a nation do not sit lightly but, with her husband who was caddying by her side, Green was immense, impressive, tough and gracious in victory.

“It feels really amazing,” the 29-year-old said. “Again, it hasn’t really sunk in, but it’s been a really crazy month. I guess it’s been four weeks since I won in Singapore. But it’s been really special to be able to do that in Australia.”

Green has made history by being the first Aussie, man or woman, ever to record three consecutive victories and, as always, she was quick to express gratitude to the great Karrie Webb (with her in the featured picture at the top).

Webb, as many of you will be aware, is the owner of seven majors, 41 titles on the LPGA tour as well as multiple other victories worldwide.  Even when she was at the height of her powers as a player Karrie was creating foundations and scholarships to support the legions of young Australian girls who were hoping to follow in her footsteps.  Hannah was the recipient of one of those scholarships more than a decade ago, receiving financial aid, travel expenses and coaching and mentoring from Webb.  She has never forgotten it.

Karrie, a sporting legend and now 51 years of age, is still very relevant in the modern game, her door always open to any young aspiring golfer seeking mentoring or help.  Talk about giving back.  Bravo the Aussies – and how marvellous to hear that she is once again to captain her country’s golf teams at the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028.

From summer Down Under to the ravages of the weather in the northern hemisphere, I can report that I am now back in Blighty – and very happy to be so.  A nasty weather system and Storm Theresa rolled over the Canaries which meant that for the last three full days of our time in Tenerife we were pretty much confined to our AirBnb.  A state of National Emergency was declared with road closures, rock falls, torrential rain and lightning and it was stressful wondering if we’d actually make it to the airport at all.

Happily we did and my hubby took an inter-island hop over to Gran Canaria where he has met up with some pals for a week’s motorbiking.  So far they’ve just had one wet day and the worst is certainly over but I was a teensy-weensy bit alarmed when he forwarded a photo of how GC had suffered a couple of days before he got there.

This is on one of their biking routes and may give you an idea of what these islands have been through.

Thankfully we didn’t encounter anything like that on our way to the airport but we did see the civic maintenance crews out on the mountain roads clearing away the rock falls and landslips.

And I used to think five footers were scary!

I was going to put a question mark after the title, in a brave effort at optimism and I wasn’t going to mention football, in an attempt to hang on to the many readers who can’t stand the game.  However, as we know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions and I’m trying to write this and watch three games at the same time:  Wales v Bosnia-Herzegovina, Czechia v Republic of Ireland and Italy v Northern Ireland.

They’re all part of the closing stages of qualifying for the World Cup and they’re all tight and tense, apart from the game in Bergamo, where Italy were 2-nil up with not much time left (and won 2-nil). ***

Anyway, ever hopeful, I travelled down to N17 last Sunday to watch Spurs play Nottingham Forest, who were just a point behind us in the relegation battle.  They’re now two points ahead after beating us 3-nil.  Essentially it looks as though only West Ham, who loathe and detest us with a passion (for reasons I’m not quite sure of), can save us from relegation.  We’re showing few signs of being able to save ourselves, particularly at home.

“You’ve got to ditch that team,” Mo said.  “They’re hopeless.”  That’s not the way it works, as she well knows.  Thanks to the great Pat Jennings (1967 FA Cup final), I’m lumbered, waiting hopefully for some decent football to cheer.  Yes, we are currently useless, devoid of confidence, too easily picked off by any side that scores first against us but better times must be ahead, surely.

Question is:  will I live to see them?

Relegation will cost Spurs untold millions but, you know, the only reason I’ll be really upset is because it’s bound to cost a lot of people their jobs, people behind the scenes, who probably don’t earn that much but love the club and work tirelessly to make things run smoothly.  They’ve undoubtedly been let down by those higher up, who are proving themselves beyond clueless.

I’m increasingly convinced, this being the era of the conspiracy theory, that Vinai Venkatesham OBE, our relatively new chief executive, who spent many years at Arsenal, is some kind of Trojan horse.  He certainly seems to be presiding over our destruction.  Doesn’t make it any better that I recently discovered that I’m related to somebody who went to the same prep school…

This being spring, officially, despite the other day when here in Lichfield we had four seasons in quick succession, including a good effort at snow, I did a bit of cleaning.  Proper cleaning.  As in hauling stuff out of awkward corners; pulling out fluff-encrusted dead slaters; wiping down cupboards; emptying said cupboards and disposing of contents dated 2017;  thinking about tackling the dreaded (but oh-so-useful) Venetian blinds; cleaning the winter boots; retrieving the summer sandals and sunhats (ever optimistic on the weather front, which could quite easily go the way of the footy).

Yes, you’ve guessed it, it’s the classic blog-avoidance strategy.

I couldn’t bear watching the aftermath of the footy, with the winners leaping about in delight (they still have one more match to win to get to the finals this summer) and the losers not knowing what to do, where to put themselves, how to stay upright, what to say…

So, never being one to give full concentration to the blog before midnight, I put on an old, almost antediluvian episode of New Tricks, which was followed by an even older Inspector Lynley mystery.  The opening scene had a smooth, suave expert witness saying he was still convinced that the woman appealing her prison sentence for murdering an abusive husband knew exactly what she was doing at the time, that there was no way she could now plead insanity.  The judge agreed and the woman’s father threatened the expert….you get the picture.

Next morning, we see the expert, in a beautiful home, giving his wife a surprise present and a kiss before heading for his swanky car.  “Hmm,” I say to myself.  “What’s going to happen here?  Is the car going to explode?  Or…?  No, the car’s going to explode.”  And, a millisecond later, that’s what happened.  I started laughing and thought, “Mo would be furious.”

Time after time, if we’re watching something together, before I can stop myself, I’ll say what I think is going to happen and often, too often, it’s right.  Could there be anything more infuriating!  It’s daft, really because I’m sure I’d be wrong about The Mousetrap.  Didn’t Winston Churchill leave at half-time because he’d sussed it out?  No way I’d outthink the great Agatha.

Anyway, golf, that great game of ours.  Played on Tuesday, in very blustery conditions, even for a person brought up on Ireland’s north Atlantic coast and staggered to what I thought was a very respectable 30 points.  The winning score was 43.  Wow.  Beyond impressive.  Perhaps I should have a lesson or two and discover the route to the practice ground.  On second thoughts, doubt that would do it.  Too late.  Too late.  As a Scottish friend was fond of saying whenever the game was driving him to distraction.

 

***Gutting.  Wales and Ireland beaten on penalties after late equalisers by the opposition and no goals in extra time.  In this case you can’t say “Ah well, there’s always next year.”  The World Cup is every four years.  Bugger.