Tuesday, August 03, 2010

Support body for rookie pros ready for action - at last!

FROM THE SCOTSMAN WEBSITE
By MARTIN DEMPSTER
The company set up to hand out £1 million over the next five years to help Scottish golfers make the transition from amateur to professional golf has now brought on board all the organisations trying to get more players from the home of golf into the world's top 100 pros.
In addressing concerns expressed by Sandy Jones, chief executive of the Professional Golfers' Association, chairman Graeme Simmers has invited Alan White, the PGA Scottish Region chairman, to join representatives of the Scottish Golf Union, the Scottish Ladies' Golfing Association and sportscotland on the board of Professional Golf Support Ltd.
Former Ryder Cup captain Bernard Gallacher has also agreed to provide an independent voice on the board and, while admitting he'd like to have seen things progress a bit quicker than they have since the project was announced in early March, Simmers, a former chairman of the R&A's championship committee, believes everything is now in place in order for the process to start in earnest.
"The first meeting was held on June 17, though Bernard Gallacher could not make it. The next meeting is at the end of August and then the one after that in second week of December. Everyone will be at those meetings," he said.
The December meeting is when the first batch of players to receive support, likely to be about £30,000 per individual per year, will be identified, the criteria being that a newly-turned professional has to have either a European Challenge Tour card or better or, on the distaff side, a Ladies' European Tour card or better.
In the event of no player achieving that status, Simmers and his fellow board members, who will receive recommendations from an operations' group led by Steve Paulding, the performance manager for Scottish Golf, could direct the money instead to players already on those circuits or, in exceptional circumstances, someone competing at a lesser level.
While excited to be involved in a project that has been talked about for around five years but is only now coming to fruition thanks to money being given to sportscotland by the Scottish Government, Simmers knows from his involvement with another sport that cash support alone isn't enough to guarantee success.
"Look at what has happened with the Lawn Tennis Association," he noted. "I'm a member of Wimbledon and every year we give £35m to the LTA. But when have we produced anyone as a result of that? It is not just a question of money. It is a question of putting the right pathways in place and I don't think tennis has done that.
"We will be holding discussions with people like Colin Montgomerie, Paul Lawrie, and Andrew Coltart, who had to go on the Swedish Tour when he had nowhere to play after turning professional."

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