Progress, yes, but women need a level playing field
IN THE 20 years I’ve been writing this column, virtually every comment piece I’ve penned on the subject of women’s golf has boiled down to the same thing — a plea for more respect.
To be fair, there have been some advances. The approach of the R&A, the governing body that did so much harm with their odious male chauvinism, is now night and day with how it was back in 2001.
In current CEO Martin Slumbers, the women have an advocate who is already proving a lasting force for good.
Furthermore, we’ve reached the point where men-only golf clubs are considered in the same bracket as the statues of slave traders, and consigned to a museum.
Last week, however, I came across a tweet from English former professional Sophie Walker that stopped me in my tracks and underlined that, though it’s hard to believe, we’ve actually gone backwards in some areas.
Walker pointed out that, despite the fact there are 48 English professionals competing on the Ladies European Tour, there hasn’t been an LET event in England since 2015, and there hasn’t been an English Open since 2008.
Goodness me, when you put it like that, it really does shine a light on the game’s systemic failure to look after its own.
England provides a third of the team who deliver a victory in the greatest Solheim Cup of all time at Gleneagles last year and yet can’t put on a tournament?
That’s why it was so good to see Justin Rose put his hand in his pocket and his management company organise a series of eight one-day events for women around the country that will begin on Thursday at Brokenhurst Manor in hampshire. Royal St George’s and Wentworth are also among the grand list of venues.
All right, the sums involved are modest — Rose is contributing £35,000 — but that was never the point. Rose felt embarrassed that he could get back to work at the Charles Schwab Challenge last week but there was no outlet for his female equivalent.
‘The dreams the girls have are just the same as the men’s, but it’s the opportunities that are skewed,’ he said. ‘Professional sports people are not machines — we can’t just power on and go. We have to nurture our skills in order to rely on them when we’re under pressure.’
Rose’s kindly gesture will hopefully prove a conversation starter, and these events the beginning of a drive to get an event in England back on the tournament schedule, to go alongside the Scottish Open and the British Open.
This summer, the men will rediscover the joys of playing golf in these isles, with the advent of an annual UK swing. In the not-toodistant future, is it really so much to ask that it happens for the women as well?