In a Class of Her Own

It was exhilarating stuff and precisely what the crowd wanted. After months of hearing rather more about issues surrounding the women’s game (notably the no-women situation at various UK clubs) than the women’s golf itself, they were finally witnessing some play - and some great play at that.

With her eye firmly on that fourth successive major, Inbee followed up with a birdie at the 10th to go to move to six under the card. That done, spectators accommodated a couple of Inbee pars and patiently awaited a fresh rush of birdies.

What they got were two bogeys and a double-bogey, with the latter Inbee’s first double of the year in a major championship context. Having knocked her second into the greenside bunker at the 16th, she had played out sideways and taken three putts from 35 feet.

Yet her gentle acceptance of what was, in her book, a more than minor golfing mishap, was no less riveting than her earlier sub-par play. She showed not so much as a hint of irritation, with the only slumped shoulders belonging to her hundreds of new-found Scottish fans.

In truth, one appreciated that aspect all the more after a handful of unseemly incidents at the subsequent Solheim Cup in Colorado. Though the standard of play out there was electrifying and the match result a glorious win for the Europeans, the players were too often downright rude.

Stacy Lewis, who had won the Ricoh, publicly tore into the referee who had admittedly made a botched job of a ruling; Paula Creamer shouted at Charley Hull and Jodi Ewart-Shadoff after they had inadvertently done the wrong thing on a green, while Hull and Ewart-Shadoff were too be seen giggling nervously in the wake of that incident. Again, there were complaints about a Spaniard - I know not which - giving cheek to a senior rules official who was more than a little put out. The women, she said, had become every bit as rude as the men when they were not getting their own way.