McManus on a mission to bag the Cup
AS HE strode the verdant fairways of Adare Manor yesterday, JP McManus may have thought back some 30 years to when he first considered purchasing the lush lands of Lord Dunraven.
Had his bid been successful, McManus would probably have had horses wandering on the estate by now, not four elite Irish golfers with seven majors, three Irish Opens and the badge of honour as a winning Ryder Cup captain for Europe between them.
McManus said he was relieved to lose out to Tom Kane, a former US marine fighter pilot, back then for when the property returned to the market in 2014, he was armed with the financial muscle and a burning ambition.
He bought it for a knockdown €25million and set about an extensive rebuild, at a cost of between €50m and €100m, depending on who you believe.
Not only did McManus want to put in place a special golf course and a luxury hotel resort, he was prepared to do whatever it took to lure the Ryder Cup to his beloved home county.
Just as Dr Michael Smurfit and the K Club were successful in their bid for the 2006 K Club, so McManus began to put together a proposal to influence the major stakeholders in sport — chiefly the European Tour hierarchy and highprofile golfers.
Through the annual Pro-Ams at Pebble Beach and Dunhill Links, and his own five Pro-Ams in Limerick, McManus has built up more contacts than most in the sport.
To deliver the Ryder Cup to the banks of the Maigue, he will need them.
While most of the focus yesterday was on the exhibition fourball involving Rory McIlroy, Paul McGinley, Pádraig Harrington and Shane Lowry, there was another quartet off the course whose presence was just as significant. Alongside McManus in the newly-fitted clubhouse breakfast room yesterday was Dermot Desmond (below), his long-time golfing friend and business associate.
The European Tour were represented by Keith Pelley, the chief executive, and the man he succeeded, George O’Grady, now the European Tour ambassador.
As the sun blazed down on the inland links re-modelled by the acclaimed architect Tom Fazio at a significant cost, Pelley and O’Grady went for a gander around the 170acre property.
When the match was on the fourth hole yesterday, O’Grady was on his own at the second green, quietly observing and noting.
Florida-based Fazio says ‘most golfers will have never seen anything like this course’ but O’Grady wasn’t thinking from a golfer’s perspective, rather he was imagining this lush Limerick retreat with 25,000 people milling about on three days in late September.
Were there sufficient vantage points? Were the greens visible to spectators? Was there room for grandstands? And, crucially, space for corporate boxes and signage?
The course has the look of a Ryder Cup venue and is far easier to get around on foot than the craggy climbs of Gleneagles.
From a match play perspective, the closing stretch is tailor-made for drama with a risk and reward par-four 15th, a devilish par-three 16th over water and a closing long hole where the raised green is bordered by the river. McManus now has the means and motive to stage the Ryder Cup in Adare Manor. He knows he’s in the running in a select field where you get nothing for second place, and the 2026 Ryder Cup is his winning post. In his distinguished career as a gambler, bookmaker, businessman and horse owner, he has usually managed to be on the right side of the result. But should McManus land the Ryder Cup on his front door, it will represent his greatest sporting coup of all.