Last weekend the club championships were on. Besides having a long working weekend, it turned out to be a thrill in the end. The boys in for standing a chance to win it were all boys I like a lot and I would have loved seeing each of them winning the title. In the end, it was pure drama. Last hole and Boy 1 is 2 shots in the lead. But the gallery of maybe 120 odd onlookers eager to see the finish, erodes their nerves. The approach shot of the boy in the lead goes into a bush unplayable, missing the crowd by an inch but the green by 20 meters. The follower up hits his ball almost dead to the flag, leaving himself a 1,5 m putt. But things go all awry for both. The pitch doesn’t even reach the green and the putt doesn’t go in either. Our senior golf professional, standing next to me – a true blue Scot and very experienced player holding five or so PGA Senior titles – mumbles: “it is in”, as the boy lines up for his putt. But I didn’t agree. I said: “it ain’t. This is taking too long.” And miss he did. So it was all up to a sudden death play off. The entire crowd followed those two young, brilliant boys, hacking down the par 4 tenth hole. This boys hold handicaps around zero, but they got all fidgety. Their nerves not up to crowds and pressure. Both teed off quite decently, but the second shot of one in a bunker, the other one into the pond. Third shot for the first still in the bunker, this time stuck to the edge of it. And on it went, untill one sunk his putt and the other didn’t, thus giving away trophy and title. His father stood next to me, as he missed and sighed: “Now his complaints won’t stop for at least a fortnight.” As I walked up to him for consolation, he insisted to give up golf for good. Mind you, after the price-giving he could be seen heading toward the golf course with his twin brother once more to train. What can I tell you, those boys are just great.
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