³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

before his second round at the is the latest in a string of rules controversies to hit the game and begs the question of whether the way rules are administered needs to be changed.

The Irishman, who ended the first round just a shot off the lead after apparently firing a brilliant 65, should in fact have signed for a 67 to include a two-stroke penalty.

It was only when officials consulted the feedback section of the that the offence came to light. The three-time major winner knew he had touched the ball at the time but thought it had merely oscillated rather than moved position.

Read the rest of this entry

Abu Dhabi

All four 2010 major winners and the world number one are competing in the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship this week but all the talk in the build-up surrounds a player who does not even register on the current world rankings.

for what has been termed a "serious breach" of the rules at last year's Russian Challenge Cup raises difficult issues for the game.

That it has become the major topic of conversation on the eve of a tournament that boasts such a stellar cast list serves to show how seriously transgressions of golf's rules are taken within the game.

As Lee Westwood pointed out: "You don't see us jumping in the referee's face when something goes wrong and waving our fingers at him trying to get the other player on the other side of the fairway carded. You don't see us missing a putt and diving.

Read the rest of this entry

The room was flat, the team were down and losing. With one day to put it right, a call to arms was needed and there was only one person who could provide it - the vice-captain. This was the scenario in the European team room at the 2008 Ryder Cup.

Sir Nick Faldo's side were struggling to summon the spirit that is usually at the heart of Europe's attempts to win the famous trophy in its biennial clash with the United States.

Someone needed to speak up and that man was Jose Maria Olazabal,

"I still have goosebumps now about it," recalls Ian Poulter, who was Europe's star man in that 2008 match. "He didn't need to speak for long. He was very quiet but what he had to say was very meaningful. He said it with a lot of , he said it from the heart.

"When you get that kind of stuff from someone like Ollie, who has been that passionate for so long, it just moves everybody. It was a kind of lump-in-the-throat job."

Read the rest of this entry