Turnberry has played an important role in Open history ... it should also be part of its future

WHILE fair weather golfers are now dolefully putting the clubs back in the shed, interest in the game doesn’t just stop because the dank days and dark evenings are upon us.

For aficionados of the sport, there’s never any shortage of subjects to debate until the point when the dreaded fairway mats and winter greens are no more once again. And no topic evokes quite as much discussion as the venue for the greatest tournament of them all.

We know that Royal Birkdale will host next year’s Open with the championship returning to St Andrews in 2027.

It’s anticipated that the venue for the following year will soon be announced by the R&A.

The decision will be revealing; Just how much is the governing body driven by revenue? How is this balanced with the desire to ensure the greatest championship is played at the greatest courses?

Absolutely no one is blinded to the need for the Open to be a roaring commercial success. The money the R&A makes through its showpiece event helps grow all facets of the game - amateur, junior, women’s, disability golf, among them.

Right now, the till is merrily ringing like never before. There were 280,000 paying customers in Portrush this summer - that’s 42,000 more than when the course last staged the event in 2019.

Only the 2022 Open at St Andrews, with 290,000 people on the property, had more present. Happy days all round then.

If making money was the only point of the exercise, though, the championship would rarely leave the Home of Golf.

But it’s not. The Open has always been so much more than a means to turn a coin for the organisers. It has prestige and history stretching back to its first staging at Prestwick in 1860. The variety of its backdrops is one of its main strengths.

While 14 courses have hosted the event since its inception, there are 10 currently on the rota.

Muirfield, which last hosted in 2013, is back in contention after abandoning its men-only policy.

But with the Scottish Open being staged next door at The Renaissance Club until 2030, there are obvious practical impediments to Muirfield hosting the sport’s biggest tournament the following week.

Unlike Muirfield, Turnberry has never actually been off the list. It’s just felt like it in recent times.

The backdrop to the ‘Duel in the Sun’ in 1977 - when Tom Watson famously held off Jack Nicklaus - hasn’t hosted the Open since 2009 when Watson, then aged 59, was pipped by Stewart Cink in a play-off.

Purely from a sporting perspective, this seems senseless. While the identity of the best course on these islands is naturally a subjective matter, by common consent, the Ailsa Course has few equals, if any.

So why the impasse? That the R&A took a dim view of Donald Trump’s purchase of Turnberry back in 2014 is a matter of record.

Just a year back, outgoing chief executive Martin Slumbers said: 'We’ve never taken Turnberry off the rota.

'The position at the moment, in respect of Turnberry, is that we will not be taking events there until we’re comfortable that the whole dialogue will be about golf.

'That is a situation we’re still not comfortable with, but that could evolve in the coming years.'

That needed little interpretation; There was a fundamental concern that the high-profile owner would overshadow the Open itself.

Speaking at Portrush last summer, though, Slumbers’ successor, Mark Darbon, talked more of practicalities than personalities.

‘We love the golf course - we’ve not taken it out of our pool of venues - but we have some big logistical issues there,' he said.

'You’ve seen the scale of the set-up here (Portrush) and there’s some work to do on the road, rail and accommodation infrastructure around Turnberry.'

Be that as it may. By their very nature, though, links courses are invariably coastal and, therefore, tricky to access. Anyone who’s attempted to drive to any one of them on the day of a tournament will testify to this.

Is Turnberry that much harder to get in and out of than, say, Royal St George’s? If there’s a will, there surely should be a way.

Back in 2009, 123,000 spectators were at Turnberry over the week. That may be low compared to those who flocked to Portrush in July but, it’s also 16 years ago.

There were 201,000 at St Andrews in 2010, 237,000 there in 2015 and 290,000 in 2022. Troon also saw a huge jump between 2016 (173,000) and 2024 (258,000). The R&A have done a fine job of getting more people through the gates.

Whatever the logistical challenges then, a return to Turnberry would come with an expectation of extremely healthy crowds.

The Ailsa was already one of the finest golf courses on the planet when Jack and Tom were in their pomp. Recent changes, including a new cliffside green on the 7th hole, make a compelling argument for it being the best on the Open rota.

You could have been forgiven for believing Darbon was nodding towards this when the issue was raised in the summer.

'It’s not about just being bigger,' he added. 'It’s about being better. So, it’s not about just simply the volume of people.'

It’s indicative of golf’s enduring popularity that the majority of weekend hackers will need to roll a double six to get a ticket for next summer’s Open on Merseyside.

But that won’t prevent them from counting the moments until they are sat in front of their televisions.

Whether in person or from a distance, there’s nothing to touch seeing the best players on the planet jousting for ownership of the Claret Jug on the one of the game’s most iconic courses.

The magnificent Ailsa forms an integral part of the Open’s storied history. It should also be part of its future.