Keep your club face neutral

In recent years, through the use of radar tracking equipment, it has been proven that the club face has around an 85 per cent control over the initial direction the golf ball will travel.

As such, club face orientation throughout the swing has become much more important than previously believed and we must try to keep our club face as neutral as possible throughout our swing if we want to keep the ball in play.

The first move from the ball should be a simple rock of your shoulders, with your arms remaining the same distance from your body. This will put the club shaft into a position where it is parallel to your target line and the toe of your club will be pointing slightly in front of you (step 1).

If you over rotate your shoulders and forearms on the move away, then your club face will open, and the club shaft will move too far around your body with your club face pointing more skywards (step 2). This position will cause your golf ball to fly to the right or left — without you knowing which one is coming!

With the correct control of your club face, when you reach the top of your back swing, the back of your left wrist will be fairly flat and with the club face sitting at around 45 degrees (step 3). This will prevent any flipping of the wrists to square the club face through impact and will see you hitting more fairways and greens.

Try practising in front of a mirror until you become used to this movement.