So who labelled golf club champ a ‘cheating ****’?
WITH its £4,000 joining fee and strict rules on dress and etiquette, Wimbledon Park Golf Club prides itself on its highly respectable image.
So the well-heeled members of the South-West London club were left in shock last week when they received the results of its annual Pro-Am competition, conveniently delivered in an emailed newsletter.
The winner for the best performance on the 17th hole – the club’s six-times champion Kenny Marshall – was listed as: ‘Kenny Marshall (CHEATING ****)’.
Unsurprisingly, who was responsible for inserting the untrue and offensive accusation is now the talk of the club bar, where members include television stars Ant and Dec, Ainsley Harriott and Ben Shephard.
Mr Marshall, 51, part-owner of a multi-million-pound wholesale grocery business, is now consulting his lawyers about the astonishing slur.
And an internal investigation has been launched at the club, where the atmosphere is now said to be ‘toxic’. When asked by The Mail on Sunday this week how the newsletter’s results could have been circulated with such an offensive addition, general manager Patrick Shanahan refused to comment.
‘There’s absolutely nothing I can say about this,’ he said, even when asked if the club had apologised to Mr Marshall.
It is the second scandal to rock the picturesque golf club in the past 12 months – with both incidents involving Mr Marshall. A bitter row erupted last year when he sued fellow member Jeff Clargo for libel.
Mr Clargo, 61, had branded wholesale grocer Mr Marshall an ‘odious and foul-mouthed cheat’ in an email sent to members of the club.
Mr Marshall said he had been compared to the ‘despicable and villainous’ Goldfinger, from the 1964 James Bond film in which Goldfinger tries to cheat on the golf course against 007.
Mr Clargo, a retired kitchen firm director, was temporarily suspended over the email and the libel action was recently settled out of court. Mr Marshall says he has received a ‘full apology’.
Mr Clargo is denying involvement in the new slur against Marshall. ‘This latest incident has nothing to do with me. There is no ongoing dispute,’ he said yesterday.
Mr Marshall, who won the section of the Pro-Am by landing his ball closest to the 17th hole with two shots, said he had read the offending newsletter but could not comment further.