At La Costa we did two things - Reduce turf to save irrigation, and sand cap fairways to improve growth (existing soil had lots of salts in it, requiring adding new soil on top) We did find that the irrigation requirement for sand cap went up, offsetting the turf reductions somewhat. Makes sense that in a given climate, sand requires more water than silt or clay, so pointing out a UK course that doesn't have irrigation may give a false sense of what happens.
Soils and course design is a complicated question. For instance, no one had mentioned how sand erodes so more easily than clay, and thus, you may need to add catch basins just to control long or steep drainage runs. Sometimes you do it just to get yourself through grow in. We recently had a remodel where the soil was sandy and the irrigation of the outer roughs inadequate. Turf dried out and died, bare spots started eroding, etc. So, in the USA anyway, sandy soils can require both drainage and irrigation for proper management, with the correct amounts obviously varying with climate.
Years ago, working for Killian and Nugent, I built Lake Arrowhead next door to where Sand Valley is now. We found water still ponded both pre and post construction either due to soil build up on the former wooded land or thatch build up in the turf. Since then, I have never not added catch basins in low spots even on sand soils. At LA, I didn't bother to connect them with pipes, but oil drum barrels with their bottoms and tops cut out, allowed the water to get through the first thatch layer and start draining in the hundreds of feet of native sand.
Of course, even forgetting the used oil drums, environmentalists (if aware and watching) wouldn't allow that today because golf course chemicals get down to the water table faster in sand. (most/many incidences of contaminated water table are in sandy soil areas, or around wells where farmers and others fill their tanks carelessly) Thus, in most places, some would suggest that a collection system dumping drainage in settling ponds is more required in sand than clay.....Either way, for practical reasons or environmental ones, I basically treat drainage about the same in any soil. Typically, catch basins and pipe end up being smaller in sandy soils, since you assume a higher percentage percolates through.