A great summer of golf but is it just too much, too close together?
The best spell of the season, but also the worst. Maybe not the summary of four weeks of covering top-class golf you might expect but an honest admission and one that merits food for thought before the dust settles on a stretch that, for this correspondent at least, has taken in the Scottish Open, the Open Championship, Ladies Scottish Open and the Women’s British Open.
It’s a journey that started at Dundonald Links, resumed there after a trip south of the Border to Royal Birkdale before ending at Kingsbarns, where travelling to and from Dalgety Bay for six successive days has left me fancying a crack at rallying after having to negotiate some of those roads in the East Neuk that twist and turn endlessly.
The highlight of that odyssey was undoubtedly watching Jordan Spieth become Open champion for a first time in such spectacular fashion and, given the way he embraces the challenge that links golf provides, we can surely expect the Claret Jug to end up in his hands at least once or twice more in years to come, which certainly wouldn’t be a bad thing at all because the Texan really is a credit to his sport.
Pleasing, too, in Southport was seeing Richie Ramsay, a man who can definitely still have his best years ahead, do himself justice on one of the biggest stages, where David Drysdale also produced a performance that, coupled with a closing 63 in the Irish Open a fortnight earlier, can give him the belief to now go on to claim a maiden European Tour victory.
While Callum Shinkwin might think otherwise, of course, the Aberdeen Asset Management Scottish Open produced a worthy winner in Spaniard Rafa Cabrera Bello on the strength of his closing 64 and a brilliant second shot to the last in the play-off at Dundonald Links, where South Korea’s Mi-hyang Lee was equally impressive on the final day as she landed the women’s equivalent.
It was the first time that the two events had been staged on the same course and, as Aberdeen Asset Management’s chief executive Martin Gilbert, was quick – understandably – to jump in with a tweet, they certainly ticked a box in helping the world’s top players get ready for the Open Championship and the Women’s British Open. Seven of the top ten at Birkdale and eight out the top ten at Kingsbarns had been at Dundonald Links the previous week.
That’s great and is something that can only help ensure both Scottish Opens continue to attract top-class fields, but, and I sincerely hope I can be proved wrong on this on, I fear the ladies’ event is always going to suffer in terms of crowds in comparison to the men’s one when they are staged so close together at the same venue, and that was certainly the case on the Ayrshire coast.
Admittedly, the weather for the Ladies Scottish Open wasn’t exactly favourable in terms of attracting crowds and, unfortunately, that was also the case for the Ricoh Women’s British Open at Kingsbarns, where heavy showers hit all four days and, at times, conditions turned very nasty, spoiling what should really have been a memorable day out for spectators at one of the most scenic courses in the country.
If the sun had been out, perhaps a few more people would have stayed around to see another impressive South Korean, In-kyung Kim, round off her polished performance, though another factor in that was a late finish, something, frustratingly so, that is dictated by US television, not just with this event but also the Scottish Opens and, to a lesser extent, The Open. I nev- er thought I’d ever say this but, by the end of that month-long run, I actually feel a bit scunnered by golf. And, although I know it will only take a few golf-free days for my passion for the sport to come flooding back, I now see the problem Scotland has in terms of trying to attract crowds to events when there are so many in such a short space of time.
That’s one of the reasons why the Paul Lawrie Match Play, held at Murcar Links and Archerfield Links over the past two years, is being staged in Germany next week and it really is unfortunate, to say the least, that next year’s Ladies Scottish Open at Gullane will be up against the first Senior Open Championship on the Old Course at St Andrews.
Have we now arrived at the stage where there are just too many events in the melting pot at the same time? Perhaps.
“I see the problem Scotland has in terms of trying to attract crowds to events when there are so many in such a short space of time”