The Open just a short putt away
When this week’s tournament actually gets under way and 27,000 people per day crank-up the atmosphere to fever-pitch by Sunday, the debate about this special place hosting The Open will surely change from ‘If’ to ‘When?’
Observers from the Royal and Ancient will be among the vast attendance at Royal Portrush for an event which has already broken European Tour ticket sales records by selling-out in advance for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Padraig Harrington is just one of many Tour professionals in action this week who believes the 7,143 yards Dunluce Links at Portrush already poses a golfing challenge worthy of the game’s oldest and biggest Major Championship.
Equally, the credentials of Portrush and Northern Ireland as a hotbed of golf and breeding ground for Major-winners — namely Fred Daly, Graeme McDowell, Rory McIlroy and Darren Clarke — has amplified calls for the Open to return here for the first time since 1951.
Along with the fetid atmosphere generated yesterday by the 4,200 spectators who purchased daily tickets to attend practice with countless thousands of Irish Open season-ticket holder, every nook and cranny reeks of history.
A short walk down the side of the 18th from the Royal Portrush clubhouse, where the Open Gold Medals won by Daly in ’47 and Clarke last year are on display, one finds the homely headquarters of Rathmore Golf Club. In the hallway is a vast display case containing gold and silver booty collected by McDowell at the US Open, two Ryder Cups and the myriad other professional and amateur events this 32-year-old son of Portrush has won.
They produce golfing giants and seem to make history for fun on the Causeway Coast, so a second visit by The Open makes perfect sense.
Whether it happens or not is all down to logistics, politics, corporate considerations and hard cash. As R&A Playing Ambassador Padraig Harrington explained yesterday, the profits generated at The Open fund the R&A’s worldwide efforts to sustain and grow the game.
Though Harrington insisted he’d no inside knowledge of the promotion and staging of The Open, the Dubliner expected the R&A would be well able to absorb any shortfall in receipts incurred by a visit to Portrush.
While the Open at St Andrews can accommodate up to 200,000 spectators, the R&A were delighted with the 123,000 who bought tickets for the Championship’s return to Turnberry on Scotland’s West Coast in 2009. That’s not a lot more than the 108,000 who will pack the fairway ropes on all four tournament days at this year’s Irish Open.
And European Tour officials reveal that with long-term planning and infrastructure changes, the capacity of Royal Portrush could be increased significantly from this year’s figure.
Antonia Beggs, championship director for this year’s Irish Open, says she has never known such anticipation or excitement in the run-up to a regular European event ? and she has worked on around 72 of them in 12 years working for the Tour.
“I’m used to it from a Ryder Cup perspective,” said Mrs Beggs. She has worked on three Ryder Cups, including the 2006 edition at The K Club and, for the record, this is her fourth Irish Open.
“But for a main European Tour event,” she added: “none of us have known anything like this. I think the Irish Open probably was like this more than 20 years ago (in halcyon days at Portmarnock, Royal Dublin and Woodbrook). It’s probably returning to that.”
Mrs Beggs insists the R&A, through their long experience in staging The Open, are the only people who can accurately judge if Portrush is capable of hosting their Championship. But, she added: “If you’re asking me whether (Portrush) can stage a large event that can host 50,000 people a day, I believe it can, with time and The Open gives you a eight or nine years to prepare for it. At a logistic and infrastructure level, |I don’t |see why it can’t be done."