Now it may seem strange for my first article on a football club blog not to be about the beautiful game; but I have caught an infection recently called golf fever. Up until a couple of months ago I took the view that golf was something that only old people played to while away the hours until their impending death. But that view has changed. It was the US Open, I think (Oh dear, memory problems. I'd better go and play some golf), that first got me hooked. I was fascinated by the fact that after Day One, an Englishman was leading, in the form of Justin Rose. Of course; this didn’t last long on Day Two but I still continued to watch. The tension was rising throughout the four days and the unknown in the form of Rocco Mediate was leading. Then Tiger Woods comes along and putts an eagle (two under par) on the eighteenth across the green to draw level. Needless to say the crowd went wild but I wasn’t excited by Tiger’s putt but instead by the prospect of a full 18-hole play off on the Monday night. Long story short: Tiger won.

In case you haven’t been watching (why?); the Ryder Cup has been taking place over the last weekend. I must explain for the readers who take the same view on golf that I used to that the Ryder Cup is a contest between the United States of America and Europe that takes place every two years. The competition takes the form of match play where players compete for each hole through a series of three different games.  I won’t bore you with any more details (although I probably have already). So I was particularly excited to learn in this issue of Sky Sports magazine (editor: am I allowed to name names?) that the Ryder Cup would be taking place at Valhalla last weekend.

Due to the time differences between GB and America; the competition would take place in the afternoons and evenings meaning that I could watch a lot of golf. My initial excitement was slightly dampened when I learned that Nick Faldo would be captaining the Europeans. For some reason I have a dislike for Nick Faldo. Don’t ask me why; I know that I’m supposed to back up my arguments with a reason but I can’t. He didn’t do himself any favours when a photographer (not me) snapped a page of his notebook during a practice session. This page was his pairings for the foursomes and would seem to give the Americans an advantage; but Nick was having none of that. He claimed that it was the player’s sandwich picks for lunch. While this was possible; it would mean that somebody would be having, for example, marmalade and jam (in actual fact, Miguel Ángel Jiménez). Yes, I really believe that Nick.

Unfortunately after day one Europe were a few points down to the USA after players who really should have won their foursomes and four balls didn’t (I’m not going to name names Mr Garcia) On Saturday once again we failed to do anything really; we pulled our arrears down to two points but again players failed to deliver (cough, Mr Harrington). We faced a tough task on Sunday and in the end the USA got the better of us as we, quite frankly crashed and burned. Personally I blame Nick Faldo who left all of our good players to the end of the singles matches. They were all leading when Jiménez missed the putt that sealed it for the Yanks but this meant that their matches were irrelevant.

At this point, when I first wrote this, I did go on to talk about football here. But after reading the sport section in both Monday’s and Tuesday’s paper I have decided to talk a little more about golf. Sorry football lovers.

I was amazed to find the amount of politics and arguments that follow. First of all were Ian Poulter’s accusations to an unnamed golfer. Now, I like Ian Poulter. Just as I don’t like Nick Faldo for no apparent reason; I like Ian Poulter for no apparent reason. Just in case you don’t read the sport section (and I hope that that is the first place you turn to!) Poulter has accused an unnamed golfer of barging into him as he left one of the tees. This golfer is rumoured to be Anthony Kim; a US golfer who scored a couple of points for his country. I’m sorry if I’m just reeling off names of golfers that I like or don’t like; but I’m writing this and I don’t like Anthony Kim. Back on topic; I can’t see why Kim would do this. I mean; his county was leading at the time. In fact they were leading all weekend. So why would he want to walk right through one of our golfers? Spot on response from Poulter though: “That wasn’t jolly nice!”

Earlier in this article I was criticising Nick Faldo. I don’t take any of those comments back but I did find it interesting to read that the Sunday singles pairings were a team decision. I’m not sure if I believe this. To be honest; I couldn’t care less. Because the truth is that we lost. Faldo failed. On a happier note; he won’t be captain at the next Ryder Cup!

Carrying on this happier note; I’d like to look forward to this weekend if I may. We haven’t had a good time of things lately but I still feel like singing that great Monty Python song: “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life, Da Da, Da Da Da Da Da Da.” Or something like that. It’s not as if we have been playing that badly but the results haven’t been coming. Personally I’m hoping that this weekend these performances will materialise into some positive results. So, I’m going to leave it there for now and hopefully when I write this next week I will be writing of; if not a clean sweep, at least a good set of results. Good Luck All.