A sad day for golf in the UK

Post by Sports Writer, Derek Clements

THE BBC should be ashamed of themselves. Not content with allowing Sky to outbid them in the contract process to host The Open Championship, our supposedly finest broadcaster has now announced that Sky can have the thing one year early.

The BBC were meant to broadcast the tournament for the final time in 2016, but have decided that it would not be financially prudent to do so. What? Can you believe it? Well yes, you probably can, especially if you watched their coverage of this year's Open.

The camerawork was awful throughout the event, Peter Alliss' commentary was as bad as ever but, worst of all, was what they did on the final day. The Open was completed on a Monday, giving the broadcaster a fantastic opportunity to hook millions of extra television viewers. Instead, with the players on the course, we were treated to repeats of Homes Under The Hammer and Bargain Hunt before they finally decided to head to St Andrews for some live coverage. Alliss, you may remember, signed off by assuring us that from 2017 we would still be able to see some highlights programmes on Saturday and Sunday nights.

Read the statement released by the R&A this week following contract negotiations with the BBC >>>

Do us a favour and don't bother. They have lost The Open, they lost The Masters and now we are down to two days of live golf a year on our national broadcasters. The American broadcasters can't get enough of golf. It is a fantastic game, played by gentlemen - nobody throws hissy fits, nobody punches opponents, nobody storms off mid-interview and nobody boycotts a channel because it was critical or had a go at an individual or a member of somebody's family. Football, please take note.

Sky will, of course, do a wonderful job of broadcasting The Open, just as they have done with the other majors, with the Ryder Cup, with the Solheim Cup and with the PGA and European Tours. Yes, we will become frustrated by the advertising breaks. But we can be certain that the camerawork will be superb, that the interviews will be entertaining, relevant and in-depth, that more innovations to enhance our viewing experience will be introduced. In short, Sky will be everything to The Open that the BBC have not been for years.

But there is one key difference. Where the BBC remains a subscription-free channel, Sky is not. That means that the number of viewers will fall. More worrying than that is the fact that the numbers of young viewers will tumble exponentially. And what does that mean for the long-term? It means that fewer youngsters will be inspired to take up the game by seeing their heroes on television. And that can only be bad news for the future of golf.

It would, of course, be entirely wrong to put the blame for golf's worldwide decline at the feet of the BBC. Obviously. However, the broadcaster must bear some responsibility if this nation of ours fails to produce the next Tony Jacklin, the next Nick Faldo, the next Rory McIlroy because our youth has not been given the chance to be inspired by television pictures being beamed into our households.

This is a sad day for broadcasting, but it is a sadder day for the game of golf.

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