Finding a quiet corner to enjoy the Springboks

STANDREWS, Scotland: After watching the last putt holed and filing my report after Saturday’s third round of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, I bolted up the road from the Royal & Ancient clubhouse to the 1 Golf Place Hotel – it’s only a nine-iron away – to watch the start of the Scotland-South Africa rugby game on television.

The hotel’s popular pub was packed with loud Scottish supporters and I could only find a seat on a flight of stairs. But once the Boks had stretched their lead to 20-3 by half-time, the disappointed locals started filing out the door and I was able to grab a chair. By the final whistle one fellow in my corner of the room had fallen asleep, and a woman had given up on the Scots and was clapping for the Springboks. “They were just a wee bit strong for our boys and deserved to win,” she reasoned.

Jason White in yesterday’s Mail on Sunday agreed with her: “We were,” he wrote, “stuck in a heavyweight contest, taking the punches but weren’t able to dish any out.”

“Scotland, it seems, don’t do first halves,” was one of the headlines in the Sunday Post.

Over in Newcastle, in the region of 100 000 Scottish fans – many of them without tickets for the game – swelled into the town, hopeful of a famous Scottish victory. The pubs were reportedly doing a roaring trade, and none more so at The Highlander, where Bonnie Prince Charlie was said to have visited.

But Eben Etzebeth and Lood de Jager spoiled the party for them, just as Australia ruined the evening (at least until the drinks started flowing) for England supporters in the grand Alfred Dunhill Pavilion beside the Old Course’s 17th green for the tournament banquet later that evening.

Two English Sirs – cricket legend Sir Ian Botham and Sir Michael Bonnallack of golfing fame – gloomily watched the giant TV screen installed in the pavilion as their team were dismantled by the Wallabies. Finally, the two B’s couldn’t take it anymore and stepped outside to watch the fireworks display.

“Humiliated England crash out of their own party as Aussies show no mercy,” was how the Mail on Sunday summed up the match.

Meanwhile, Ernie Els’ missed sixinch putt on Carnoustie’s 17th green last week – as many internet users will have discovered – has gone viral.

Footage under the withering banner “Is this the worst putt ever?” shows the Big Easy missing the tiddler by a considerable distance.

There were gasps from the gallery as Els jabbed the putt woefully past the hole, and the particular putter used that day has been consigned to the scrap heap, Ernie saying it just didn’t feel right in his hands.

“It was an ugly experience and I didn’t feel comfortable over the short putts, and I totally yipped that one at 17. You hear about these things and I think I showed the public the perfect yip stroke,” he said with a wry smile.