The Current Climate

Ballantine’s produce a very fine whisky – or so I’m told. Not being an expert I rely on my colleague Dominique Boulet, who many of you will know and who is a semi-professional expert in the ways of top-drawer Scotch. Dom is unlike my other colleague, Dougie Donnelly; a true Scotsman, Dougie is known, in his native land at least, as a teetotal (i.e. he eschews the amber nectar). This was a shame for him because when we turned up at the Ballantine’s Championship on the outskirts of Seoul in late April, the sponsor’s product was much in evidence. Dougie certainly missed out.

The Ballantine’s was a fine championship, despite the absence of star names Dustin Johnson, his namesake Zach and Alvaro Quiros, the ridiculously long-hitting Spaniard. They were – at least their management companies said they were – too nervous about the current political situation on the Korean peninsula to travel. Fortunately, the nearest we came to seeing a mushroom cloud was the dark pall hanging over Dom after four nights of testing the sponsor’s product.

I don't mean to make light of a potentially serious situation, but where and when players play is becoming a serious issue in golf, particularly for the European Tour. Their counterparts across the Atlantic – and the Pacific, for that matter, given the reach of the European circuit – the PGA Tour, has always attracted and continues to attract the best players from around the world. But in the current economic climate, in Europe especially, potential sponsors are not queuing up outside Tour HQ at Wentworth begging to be allowed to cough up £2 million or so for the privilege of watching journeymen professionals line their pockets with, arguably, indecent amounts of gilt.