Telfer's Thoughts 15.9.25

Our footballers, and take your pick here from the All Blacks to the Warriors, didn’t provide us with much comfort, if any, over the weekend. However, the Black Ferns helped right the patriotism ledger a little with a barnstorming win over their South African opponents at the Women’s Rugby World Cup.

Privately I was hoping the rare sight of our top three male golfers all playing in Europe’s biggest and richest tournament outside of the British Open might restore some national pride. But alas, Ryan Fox, Daniel Hillier and Kazuma Kobori, while all performing solidly at the British PGA Championship at Wentworth and all making the cut, never really got themselves in contention to win this prestigious championship, which of course Ryan Fox managed to do two years ago.

The event carried no less than US$9 million in prize money and inevitably attracted a world class field. It also provided a final hit for those players heading to New York for next week’s Ryder Cup. Most of the USA team warmed up for the Cup by playing a USPGA event in California, inevitably won by Scottie Scherffler, his 19 th victory in less than four years. The European lads meanwhile were in Wentworth sharpening their game on one of Britain’s toughest courses.

The best of the Kiwis were Kazuma Kobori and Ryan Fox who both finished in a tie for 46th place. Both earned close to NZ$100,00 for their week’s work. Just behind them was Daniel Hillier who finished tied for 52nd .

As mentioned, it was rare to see our three top male golfers competing in a DP World Tour event. You would have to go back to 1990’s or thereabouts and the days of Michael Campbell, Frank Nobilo and Greg Turner, all of whom regularly teed it up in the same event. All three enjoyed plenty of success in Europe with numerous wins there among them.

What was particularly enjoyable watching the live television coverage of the four days of this latest event was the ability we had to watch every shot Ryan Fox played for most of his rounds. The British television producers sent out two separate live productions by satellite. One was the standard coverage across all 18 holes with emphasis on the leading 8-10 golfers. However the second production followed just two groups. Fortunately for us in New Zealand, Ryan was in one of those featured groups each day.

Although he may have only finished in 46th place, Foxy played a lot of very good golf, particularly on the greens. He finished the tournament with the second-best putting record from the field of 156 starters, averaging just 24 putts per round. His driving wasn’t as accurate as it usually is. Conditions for a couple of days were very windy and this was Foxy’s first start for the best part of a month, so I think we can cut him a little slack here and suggest his next outing will see an improvement in this part of his game. Kobori the rookie was again as he usually is from week to week remarkably neat and tidy in everything he did. And speaking of stats, Kazuma Kobori, probably the youngest player in the tournament, finished the four days as the most accurate driver in that field of 156. Remarkably, his tee shots found the fairways 92% of the time - a truly amazing statistic. No-one else got near that figure. On the last day, for example, he didn’t record a single bogey, helped immeasurably by his deadly accurate driving. He has now lifted his earnings in his first full year as a professional to E681,000 - that’s just over NZ$1.3 million, not bad for a 24-year-old lad from Rangiora and he still has another half dozen or so events he can play before the season ends if he so wishes.