Golf: Ryder in a storm of controversy

As the battle to host the 2009 Ryder Cup hots up, Alan Campbell reports on the setback to Scotland's hopes following the confusion over the bidding process

The Sunday Herald, 11 February 2001

Two interested spectators at Hampden last Wednesday night for the CIS Cup semi-final between Celtic and Rangers were Scotland's First Minister, Henry McLeish, and Sandy Jones, chief executive of the Professional Golfers' Association.

McLeish, who earlier met Jones for the first time at a reception in Edinburgh, had been anxious to convey to his guest that the sooner a decision was made on which country will host the 2009 Ryder Cup, the better.

As the Old Firm game ended amid scenes of acrimony and chaos, Jones was likely to have departed morosely. Rangers, the team he has supported since he was a boy growing up in Lanarkshire, had been beaten 3-1, with Claudio Reyna and Michael Mols eliminating themselves from today's league business after collecting red cards.

To former East Fife player McLeish, the outcome of the bidding process was more important than the Hampden result. But on Thursday he must have felt much as Jones did the night before when word filtered through that Scotland, like fellow bidders England and Wales, will have to wait until mid or late summer before the 2009 outcome is known.

Not that he, or anybody involved in the Scottish or Welsh bids, heard this news officially. It dripped out via a local newspaper in the north-east of England, where Jones was visiting the Slaley Hall bid team prior to moving on to Celtic Manor on Friday to meet the Welsh delegation.

When I spoke to Jones that evening, he revealed that it could be as late as the end of August before a decision on the host country for 2009 is taken. If that is the case, the choice of course will also be made at around the same time.

This new timetable throws the Scottish effort into confusion because the plan had been for the five courses in contention - Carnoustie, St Andrews, Gleneagles, Loch Lomond and Turnberry - to stick together as one bid until the choice of country was known at the end of this month. Now, it appears, the courses will have to make their own separate bids against Slaley Hall and Celtic Manor.

At the moment, then, the bidding process is about as clear as a muddy pool. Given that the Ryder Cup will be worth an estimated £100m to the winning country, the method of selection seems remarkably casual - and is in danger of descending into the kind of atmosphere which characterised the last few minutes of the Hampden battle.

Take the Ryder Cup committee. This consists of three professional golfers from the PGA - Scots David Huish and Jim Christine, plus Jim Weaver - and three from the European Tour - Neil Coles, Angel Gallardo and John O'Leary.

With no disrespect to any of the six, what qualifications do they have to make a decision that is so important to local economies that the governments (or whatever they are allowed to call themselves) of Scotland and Wales are heavily involved, while the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, supports the English bid?

This is a high stakes game being decided by a committee which meets quarterly. Jones, who like European Tour executive director Ken Schofield has no vote but advises the committee on the merits of the respective bids, said on Thursday: "We have plenty of time to make our decision as to where the Ryder Cup should be held."

Technically right, but pragmatically wrong. Instead of making a decision at the Ryder Cup committee meeting on Tuesday, and announcing it at the end of the month, the matter is to drag interminably on. Why? Further assessment of the merits of the bids is the official response.

Jones and the committee are playing a dangerous game. On Thursday, the PGA chief executive gave the impression to the local press that the English bid was in fine fettle, whereas the widespread view is that the race is between Scotland and Wales. Raising expectations in the North-east of England, when Slaley Hall's chances are slim, could result in a backlash for the PGA, who have the casting vote on the 2009 decision.

What started out as a gentlemanly contest could end up in the type of all-in rammy we saw last Wednesday night.