PADRAIG HARRINGTON DISQUALIFIED FOR ROUND 1 OFFENCE
FROM THE DAILY TELEGRAPH WEBSITE
By KEVIN GARSIDE
Padraig Harrington was disqualified from the HSBC Championship in Abu Dhabi this morning following the intervention of the golf police watching on TV.
Almost 24 hours after his ball moved on the seventh green when retrieving his marker, Harrison found himself hauled before the rules committee to be informed he was out of the tournament.
The offence was not that the ball had moved but that it was not replaced. That incurs a two-shot penalty. Harrington signed for a 3 on a hole that should have been scored 5. That was the offence for which he was kicked out, signing for an incorrect score that was lower than it should have been.
Harrington was aware that he had touched the ball but judged that it hadn’t moved. When put under the microscope of the super slo-mo camera it was established that the ball had rolled a fraction, three dimples was the best guess, then fell back approximately one and a half dimples, undetectable to the naked eye.
Harrington knew the rules. Had he picked up the marker to replace the ball he would not have infringed the regulations. He did not do that because he, in good conscience, did not believe the ball had advanced one iota, and therefore judged any action to be unnecessary.
Tour senior official Andy McFee sympathised, but under the rules they had no option but to swing the axe. The business of applying the sanction of disqualification on top of the penalty in cases where breaches are not detectable by the eye is now under review.
McFee conceded that the player and the game had not been served well by the disqualification but was adamant, as was Harrington, that the two-stroke penalty was the correct ruling on the basis that the ball had demonstrably moved and was not replaced.
Harrington has been here before. Eleven years ago at the B and H International at The Belfry he held a five-shot lead at the start of the final round when learned that he had not signed for his first day scorecard.
Harrington said: “I was aware I hit the ball picking up my coin. I looked down at the time and was pretty sure it had just oscillated and had not moved, so I continued on. In slow motion it's pretty clear the ball has moved three dimples forward and it's come back maybe a dimple and a half.
“At the end of the day that's good enough, but I wouldn't have done anything differently yesterday - there was nothing I could do about it at that moment in time. If I'd called a referee over it would have been pointless because if he'd asked me where my ball was I'd have said it was there. As far as I was concerned it didn't move.”
McFee, who also disqualified Harrington 11 years ago, stated: "I got an E-mail from the Tour feedback site just before six o'clock last night.
"I managed to get a look and knew immediately we had an issue. I got all members of the rules committee to look at the tape.
"Because everything was closing down I decided to sleep on it and speak to Padraig first thing this morning.
"It's a minute movement, but it's a movement and he never replaced it, so he should have included a two-stroke penalty.
"The fact that he is unaware he moved the ball, unfortunately does not help him. Because he signed for a score lower than actually taken the penalty is disqualification."
It is only two months ago, of course, that Ian Poulter lost a play-off for the Dubai World Championship after he dropped his ball on his marker and it flipped over."
Harrington's disqualification has provoked debate among the golfing fraternity.
Graeme McDowell said: “It's just not great for the game. The rules are there for everyone's protection. But, you know, is Pádraig Harrington trying to gain an advantage by what he's doing? No, he's not.
“At some point the common sense has got to take over, I think that you have to look seriously at that rule. I don't think a player should be penalised for trying to take his marker out of the way and glancing his ball.
"You know, like I say, it's a grey area and I think it's a tough rule and it's a horrible way to be DQ'd. The guy's first tournament of the year. I feel for him. It's not nice, at all.
“The rules are there for everyone's protection. But it makes a bit of a mockery of the game when we are penalising players for something as crazy as that.
"The game has had a lot of bad press lately, stupid rules; Dustin Johnson at the US PGA championship, there's too much of that going on nowadays.
“TV viewers are important to us, and High Definition and 3D and slow-mo add to the experience of watching golf on TV. But I think we need to take a serious look at the rules of golf and make sure that, yeah, they are protecting people. Some of these fiddly little pernickety, stupid little rules, you know, we need to have a look at them.”
Any comments? E-mail them to Colin@scottishgolfview.com
If you want to read comments about the Padraig Harrington disqualification from Ian Poulter and members of the public, log on to http://www.golf.com's/ "Press Tent" site.
CLICK HERE
By KEVIN GARSIDE
Padraig Harrington was disqualified from the HSBC Championship in Abu Dhabi this morning following the intervention of the golf police watching on TV.
Almost 24 hours after his ball moved on the seventh green when retrieving his marker, Harrison found himself hauled before the rules committee to be informed he was out of the tournament.
The offence was not that the ball had moved but that it was not replaced. That incurs a two-shot penalty. Harrington signed for a 3 on a hole that should have been scored 5. That was the offence for which he was kicked out, signing for an incorrect score that was lower than it should have been.
Harrington was aware that he had touched the ball but judged that it hadn’t moved. When put under the microscope of the super slo-mo camera it was established that the ball had rolled a fraction, three dimples was the best guess, then fell back approximately one and a half dimples, undetectable to the naked eye.
Harrington knew the rules. Had he picked up the marker to replace the ball he would not have infringed the regulations. He did not do that because he, in good conscience, did not believe the ball had advanced one iota, and therefore judged any action to be unnecessary.
Tour senior official Andy McFee sympathised, but under the rules they had no option but to swing the axe. The business of applying the sanction of disqualification on top of the penalty in cases where breaches are not detectable by the eye is now under review.
McFee conceded that the player and the game had not been served well by the disqualification but was adamant, as was Harrington, that the two-stroke penalty was the correct ruling on the basis that the ball had demonstrably moved and was not replaced.
Harrington has been here before. Eleven years ago at the B and H International at The Belfry he held a five-shot lead at the start of the final round when learned that he had not signed for his first day scorecard.
Harrington said: “I was aware I hit the ball picking up my coin. I looked down at the time and was pretty sure it had just oscillated and had not moved, so I continued on. In slow motion it's pretty clear the ball has moved three dimples forward and it's come back maybe a dimple and a half.
“At the end of the day that's good enough, but I wouldn't have done anything differently yesterday - there was nothing I could do about it at that moment in time. If I'd called a referee over it would have been pointless because if he'd asked me where my ball was I'd have said it was there. As far as I was concerned it didn't move.”
McFee, who also disqualified Harrington 11 years ago, stated: "I got an E-mail from the Tour feedback site just before six o'clock last night.
"I managed to get a look and knew immediately we had an issue. I got all members of the rules committee to look at the tape.
"Because everything was closing down I decided to sleep on it and speak to Padraig first thing this morning.
"It's a minute movement, but it's a movement and he never replaced it, so he should have included a two-stroke penalty.
"The fact that he is unaware he moved the ball, unfortunately does not help him. Because he signed for a score lower than actually taken the penalty is disqualification."
It is only two months ago, of course, that Ian Poulter lost a play-off for the Dubai World Championship after he dropped his ball on his marker and it flipped over."
Harrington's disqualification has provoked debate among the golfing fraternity.
Graeme McDowell said: “It's just not great for the game. The rules are there for everyone's protection. But, you know, is Pádraig Harrington trying to gain an advantage by what he's doing? No, he's not.
“At some point the common sense has got to take over, I think that you have to look seriously at that rule. I don't think a player should be penalised for trying to take his marker out of the way and glancing his ball.
"You know, like I say, it's a grey area and I think it's a tough rule and it's a horrible way to be DQ'd. The guy's first tournament of the year. I feel for him. It's not nice, at all.
“The rules are there for everyone's protection. But it makes a bit of a mockery of the game when we are penalising players for something as crazy as that.
"The game has had a lot of bad press lately, stupid rules; Dustin Johnson at the US PGA championship, there's too much of that going on nowadays.
“TV viewers are important to us, and High Definition and 3D and slow-mo add to the experience of watching golf on TV. But I think we need to take a serious look at the rules of golf and make sure that, yeah, they are protecting people. Some of these fiddly little pernickety, stupid little rules, you know, we need to have a look at them.”
Any comments? E-mail them to Colin@scottishgolfview.com
If you want to read comments about the Padraig Harrington disqualification from Ian Poulter and members of the public, log on to http://www.golf.com's/ "Press Tent" site.
CLICK HERE
Labels: EUROPEAN TOUR
posted by Colin |
See story on its own page | Friday, January 21, 2011
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