FACE OF GOLF
Eilidh dreamed of playing sport professionally but when that didn’t work out, she followed in the screen footsteps of her mentor Hazel Irvine FOXY KNOXY JOINS CLUB
Цéé Ðoy EILIDH Barbour dreamed of becoming an elite athlete but when success on the field eluded her, she chose to be at the top of her game from the sidelines.
Tomorrow, Eilidh will be established as the BBC’s new face of golf when she presents highlights from the Open.
She is replacing her idol Hazel Irvine, who is cutting back on work commitments to spend more time with her family.
For Eilidh, being so close to the cream of the sporting crop is the next best thing to being a champion herself.
She said: “If I could have had my ultimate job it would have been on that golf course or pitch, playing those shots, but I can’t.
“When you have hit that shot on to the 18th green and you know you have won the Open, what does that actually feel like? I would love to feel that, to be someone who is that good at a sport. But I do get to ask that person and get a sense of how they feel in that moment.
“At a cup final, I am sometimes the first person these guys speak to when they have lifted a trophy. That’s the closest I can get to lifting one myself.”
She may not have been a good enough sportswoman herself to make a career of it but that didn’t stop her playing everything from football to golf.
Her parents are keen golfers and as she doesn’t share a love of shopping with her mum, they spend quality time by playing a round together.
Growing up in Dunkeld in Perthshire, her primary school class was made up of 27 boys and five girls, and she always joined in for football and any other games they played.
She said: “There were a lot of boys so there were always a couple of us girls playing football with them.”
She played in the football team representing her primary, The Royal School of Dunkeld, and now plays for Partick Thistle ladies team.
Eilidh said: “It wasn’t an unusual thing to play football. There wasn’t a lot to do in Dunkeld, so when you went down to the park or were playing tennis, it was always mixed because there weren’t enough kids.
“Growing up in the country, we didn’t have cinemas and things like that on our doorstep. We were encouraged to be outside playing, not inside watching TV.”
She is glad that her upbringing in Dunkeld made her blind to the gender stereotyping associated with sport.
She said: “I have never really felt I shouldn’t be playing football. It was just natural. A lot of people say I promote women’s sport but I just promote sport.
I think everyone should be playing. It is so important people get out and enjoy themselves and be fit and be healthy. I think, ‘How could you not love going out and running about?’”
When she was 14, she watched Hazel Irvine on television. Eilidh said: “Seeing a Scottish female present Grandstand, was when I suddenly realised it was possible for me to do that as a job.
“I wasn’t ever good enough at any sports to play professionally so I thought this was the next best thing. No one ever said that it was ridiculous but whether anyone thought it was possible, I don’t know.”
She wrote to Hazel, who replied encouraging her to get experience and to stay determined.
Now Eilidh can be heard from Premier League grounds for BBC Final Score and live FA Cup matches and as a trackside reporter for BT Sport in their Champions League coverage, as well as live Scottish Premiership and Scottish League Cup matches. As a presenter, she has fronted DIANE Knox, aka former Clyde 1 DJ Foxy Knoxy, is also covering The Open, for Radio 5 Live – and will be commentating on brother Russell’s bid for glory.