Less than a day after writing about the frustrating, if gilded, career of Sandy Lyle I find myself ruminating once more on the state of Scottish golf.
Colin Montgomerie speaking both from the heart and with sense has publicly stated his frustration with the lack of talent emerging from the home of golf:
“We’ve been going through […]
The Big Five who dominated golf in the 1980’s ushered in a new era for the game in Europe. They stood toe to toe with America’s finest and came out on top. Seve, Faldo, Woosnam and Langer have remained, more or less, in the limelight.
We remember the genius of Seve, the dominance of Faldo, the […]
Where do we seek comfort and reassurance when the certainties of life crumble underneath us? For the award winning Scottish poet and novelist Andrew Greig this was the question he faced as he recovered from a potentially fatal brain condition.
The answer for Greig was to take to the golf courses of Scotland. He charts his […]
Why golf? I can’t answer that question, it only throws up more unanswerable questions. Why should golf, a game whose true intricacies I will probably never master, exert such a hold over me?
I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently. The winter and a new career in the voluntary sector have conspired to keep me […]
How do you psyche yourself up to compete with a phenomenon? Do you meekly concede defeat and scrap it out for the best of the rest crown? Do you fire up your own belief by shouting from the rooftops about how you are, indeed, a contender?
A tricky one that. Recent weeks have seen both routes […]
How many of us had the conversation. Watching some televised sport (the normal triggers are sport of a truly woeful nature or those moments of sporting exhilaration when athletes seem to transcend what is thought possible in their chosen field) the chat will inevitably come to the missed opportunity:
“Could have been me that, you know? […]
One wonders how the conversation went when Andrew “Chubby” Chandler met with Sir Alex Ferguson to find out how the Manchester United guru handles child prodigies. Chandler, agent of Northern Ireland’s boy wonder Rory McIlroy, can be commended for his thoroughness, Ferguson’s replies? We’ll never know, of course, but maybe:
“Don’t let him marry a Spice […]
One of Europe’s most popular golfers hopes to return to the fray of competitive action later this month. His many fans will be hoping that Jose Maria Olazabal can roll back the years and recapture the form that made him a double winner at Augusta.
The major wins, the Ryder Cup partnership with Seve, have ensured […]
Another golfing year dawns. And forgive me please for abiding by the calendar year and not the ridiculous European Tour calendar.
What’s in store for 2008? A Ryder Cup that, whisper it across this continent, is probably in need of an American win. The plucky underdog tag can only carry Europe so far: another whitewash will […]
Knighthood apart, Sir Clive Woodward has not been a million dollar success story since winning the 2003 Rugby World Cup with England. There was the debacle of the many players, few wins British Lions tour of New Zealand. There was the embarrassing move into football coaching with Southampton. There was the underwhelming reaction to the […]
Latest estimates suggest that one golf course in the United States will use, in one day, roughly the same amount of water as the total amount used by 15000 American citizens in the same 24 hour period.
At the same time Donald Trump is discovering that the doughty residents of the North East of Scotland are […]
It is said sport can change the world. Perhaps, perhaps not. For every story of a civil war stopping so that both side could catch a glimpse of Pele’s genius there are a thousand tales of drinking binges, doping tests and betting scandals.
Now and then, though, it is good to cast aside your cynicism and […]
Like millions of other people across Europe I’ve spent the last two days hanging on every last drop of emotion and drama that has made the Seve Trophy such compulsive viewing.
As something you’re likely to hear down the pub tonight that probably ranks alongside: “I see Ben Crenshaw’s become an atheist.”
It’s a shame that the […]
The clubhouses at Royal St George’s and Royal Lytham have no doubt been deafening dens of clinking sherry glasses and stiff upper lipped “here, here’s” this week.
But amid the madcap celebrations of their confirmation on the Open rota in 2011 and 2012 the good members of those to esteemed golfing institutions may well have heard […]
On a trip to New Zealand I noticed with amusement that a few towns advertise cliff top driving ranges as tourist attractions. That is driving ranges where you hit the ball out to sea. At some of them there is a floating target and cash prizes. At others you just do it for fun.
But hey, […]