Allenby caddie comes out swinging over bust-up

CADDIE Mick Middlemo claims Robert Allenby boasted he’d get him banned from the US PGA Tour for life before they split midround at the Canadian Open.

Allenby sacked fellow Australian Middlemo after the caddie left his bag to walk off following a blazing row on the Glen Abbey course in Ontario.

It began when Allenby blamed the veteran bagman for a wrong club choice following a triple bogey on just his fourth hole of the tournament.

Allenby alleged Middlemo told him: ‘‘I will be waiting for you in the car park’’, before walking off after nine holes.

But Middlemo was not prepared to stay silent after seeing what 44-year-old Allenby told reporters since and has given a somewhat different version to the golfer’s.

‘‘I was very disappointed he went to the media and claimed threats. There were no threats,’’ said Middlemo.

‘‘Yes, there

was

a

yelling Caddie Mick Middlemo on his dispute with Robert Allenby, right match, absolutely, but I’m not going to stand there and get bullied.

‘‘In any other workplace they wouldn’t put up with that so why should it be put up with on the golf course.’’

Middlemo said he was the fourth caddie to walk out on the temperamental Allenby midround: ‘‘It’s not an elite club. Plenty of us have done it – Sponge, Squirrel, Bussy, they’ve all done it.’’

The caddie said he’d taken exception when called him a fat c....

‘‘I’m 110 kilos and I might be a little overweight but I thought that was a touch disrespectful.

Middlemo said Allenby initially Allenby

called him a c... three times and he then challenged him to say it again.

‘‘Now that may have sounded aggressive but there was never a threat of violence,’’ he said.

‘‘I was never going to hit the guy, I’m too professional for that.

‘‘But what I was going to do if he said it again was drop the bag right down, take the bib off and just walk in from there.

‘‘So then he starts with the ‘calm down, calm down’ stuff. I told him . . . don’t bully me . . .

‘‘So then he goes on saying ‘can’t you take a joke? you’re so un-Australian’, and then while we were on the 13th green I heard him saying, ‘I don’t know why I put up with this fat c...’

‘‘I just let that go but from that point on we didn’t talk much, I just gave him yardage, he didn’t want to know anything else.

‘‘We get to 18 (his ninth) he has 151 metres to the hole, he hits a terrible shot into the back trap.

‘‘Then he nearly thins his ball into the water, then he grounds his club in a hazard, takes a drop, hits that shot about two inches, misses a putt and makes eight.

‘‘Then he stands on the back of 18 and says ‘I’m going to get a caddie banned for life on this tour today. I’m going to enjoy myself and a caddie is going to get banned for life with what happened out there today’.

‘‘I turned to him and said: ‘Are you talking to me?’

‘‘He said ‘Yes, you’re going to get banned for life today, you fat c....

‘‘Simon Clark [another caddie] was there and heard everything. I walked away, stood the bag up, put my bib on it, took everything of mine out of the bag and turned to him and said, ‘I’m done, I’m finished.’

‘‘He yelled a few obscenities and things and I just said ‘That’s fine, mate, but make sure if you see me off the course you say the same things’. Not a threat, just to make sure.

‘‘So him needing to get escorted out by police what a joke. I’m 50 years old.’’

Middlemo said he planned to return to his bar-restaurant in Atlanta and spend more time with his wife and kids.

Allenby shot a nine-over-par 81 and withdrew from the event.