“What Lee Westwood is doing at his age is pretty remarkable. What a career”
Well, first and foremost, a happy new year to everyone – here’s hoping 2021 makes up for last year and then some! Unfortunately a grim year got even worse in December with the passing of legendary golf broadcaster Peter Alliss. It’s a very sad loss, and my condolences go out to all his friends and family, but his life should be celebrated.
And what a life to celebrate – not only as a player but as a broadcaster. He had plenty of time back in the day to be able to talk and muse, whereas television is a bit faster now. He had a wonderful gift of being able to fill that time with insight and humour and he was just a lovely man. I was able to sit down with him and talk on more than a few occasions and it was a blast. He was great company and what he was like on the television was exactly how he was sitting in a lounge chair in front of a fire. He will be dearly missed.
On the course, December saw Matt Fitzpatrick prevail in the DP World Tour Championship and Lee Westwood claim the Race to Dubai crown. It’s funny, people say the Earth course at Jumeirah Golf Estates doesn’t really suit Matt, but the fairways actually bottleneck the longer you are and he gets a good 30 yards of roll, which means he’s not far behind the biggest hitters. And when you’re as accurate as he is and hole as many putts as he does, you’ve always got a chance.
It was a great performance to hold off a stellar chasing pack. To win around that track two times since 2016 is very impressive – he owns the place. Unless he goes into a slump over the next few months, he’s pretty likely to make the Ryder Cup team. It’s odd – it seems like the Ryder Cup is miles away despite it not having been contested since 2018! Just another quirk of these bizarre times. You also wouldn’t bet against Lee Westwood making yet another appearance. What he’s doing at his age is pretty remarkable and hats off to him for his third Race to Dubai title. What a career.
I do have to say, though, that I was disappointed with the strength of the field – something I feel I’ve said a few times about the closing events of the European Tour season. I want to be clear, the Tour has done a sensational job this year in staging so many high-quality events, but I think it was a mistake to not restart Ryder Cup qualifying until Abu Dhabi. If Ryder Cup points were available, I’m sure the field would have been better.
It was good to have the likes of Collin Morikawa and Patrick Reed in the field, though, and whatever you think of Reed, he makes the effort to play the European Tour and he should be commended for that. It’ll be interesting to see how things develop with regards to scheduling and fields with the new strategic alliance between the PGA and European Tours, which was announced towards the end of last year.
With the PGA Tour now having a stake in European Tour Productions and the two circuits working together on commercial opportunities, scheduling and other things, it wouldn’t surprise me to see the PGA Tour gently encouraging more of its players to compete in events like the Scottish Open and the end-of-season Rolex Series tournaments, which take place after the conclusion of the Fedexcup play-offs.
This is purely speculation, but it really wouldn’t shock me if, eventually, we have a PGA Tour Fedexcup event in Europe. I think that could happen within the next five years. I do think the alliance could be good news for the European Tour in terms of strength of fields. I hope some Americans are looking at Reed and thinking ‘Why am I not travelling the world and developing my game?’
The partnership seems to make sense for both sides. It may not be related, but it does seem as if the emergence of the Premier Golf League has only served to strengthen the relationship between the European and PGA Tours. Either way, 2021 promises to be an interesting year for pro golf!