Robert Rock provides firm base for developing future English talent - DEREK LAWRENSON's World of Golf
Robert Rock would never have got to beat Tiger Woods down the stretch in Abu Dhabi last year if there had been the current dearth of top-class professional tournaments in England when he was growing up.
So perhaps it is not surprising to see him put his weight behind the English Tour, a series of 16 two-day events for young, up-and-coming players that begins life at beautiful West Lancs on Wednesday and will take in some of the best courses in England over the next few months.
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Indeed, with visits to venues as good as Ganton and Alwoodley in Yorkshire, and Burnham & Berrow in Somerset, the schedule reads like a trainspotter’s guide to places to play. If nothing else, the young wannabes will certainly improve their golfing education.
‘I think the quality of the courses is one of the things that will give the circuit an edge over the usual mini-tours,’ argues Rock.
While the European Tour has been on one of its Far East legs, the popular Englishman has been busy at home on his driving range in the Midlands.
The 36-year-old has been working not only on his own sweet swing but overseeing the development of an elite academy of young players he is hoping to guide to the top.
Not just men, either. While Rock will play alongside most of his young flock at West Lancs, one of their number, the immensely promising Kelsey MacDonald from Scotland, has flown the nest to make her pro debut in the Turkish Airlines Open on the women’s European Tour.
‘The two areas where I feel I can really make a contribution are on the coaching side and cutting out the sort of mistakes I made,’ said Rock. ‘As for Kelsey, I don’t want to put too much pressure on her, but she is comfortably good enough to become a star in the women’s game.’
Good luck to the 22-year-old Stirling University graduate, then, and to the English Tour. It will be interesting to monitor the progress of both over the coming months.
Finest hour: Rock held off Tiger Woods to win the Abu Dhabi Championship last year QUOTE OF THE WEEK ‘Slowly but surely, every element of faith I have in the game of golf is being destroyed by the ruling bodies.’Strong words from former pro Gary Evans but entirely understandable in a truly deflating week that saw Vijay Singh somehow escape a ban for a clear violation of the PGA Tour’s anti-drugs code.
It was also one that saw the governing bodies put out a ridiculous 2,000-word press release seeking to justify why it was ‘right’ that Tiger Woods was not disqualified at the Masters, and why he was ‘right’ not to disqualify himself.
Needless to say, it failed miserably on both counts. Judgment calls like these leave us all questioning our faith.
Is there any other major sport where a player ranked 1,207th in the world could possibly be good enough to win? Step forward the 22-year-old American Derek Ernst, shock winner of the Wells Fargo Championship in North Carolina on Sunday. Yes, it’s true that the awful state of the Quail Hollow greens encouraged a lottery.
But that shouldn’t detract from the quality of his play on the closing holes to hold off the likes of third-placed Phil Mickelson and Lee Westwood, who finished fourth, nor the admirable nerve he demonstrated to prevail in a play-off against David Lynn.
The question golf writers get asked most frequently is: who’s going to win?
Following Ernst’s triumph, it is one that will leave us feeling an even greater sense of angst.
Lynn makes his mark on PGA tourYou might recall our piece with the Englishman David Lynn in January at the start of his great American adventure.
It is fair to say back then that Lynn was a little nervous as to how it would all pan out in swapping the chorus line of the European Tour for the PGA Tour at 39.
Was that runner-up finish in the US PGA Championship at Kiawah Island last August that had earned him his chance just a fluke?
American adventure: David Lynn shone at Quail Hollow but found himself in trouble in the play-off (below)Three months on, he’s certainly delivered an emphatic answer to that one. From a fourth-place finish in Florida in March to losing a sudden-death play-off in Charlotte on Sunday — not to mention being one of the stars of the first day at Augusta on his Masters debut — Lynn has demonstrated unequivocally that he belongs.
His startling displays have already secured his card for next year and, following the Players’ Championship on Sunday, afforded him the chance to return to his first love, Europe, and play over here during the summer before returning to America for the FedEx Cup.
In making the transition so seamlessly, Lynn has also rather punctured the idea that the PGA Tour has a greater strength in depth than its European counterpart.
Good for him.
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