Irish Open moved to May for first time

THE 2005 Nissan Irish Open will be played in May for the first time in the modern era.

European Tour bosses yesterday confirmed that the championship will be played at the Montgomerie Course at Carton House, Co Kildare, from May 19 to 22.

On its revival by PJ Carroll in 1975, the championship was played in August and in the interim has gone into June and more recently to the week after the Open Championship in July.

The June date was lost when Murphys ended their sponsorship in 2002 and the later July date proved problematic when attempting to attract players who often opted to take a break that week after a hectic schedule.

Gerard O’Toole, executive chairman of Nissan Ireland, stressed that the date and the prize fund were the key factors to be considered in their continued sponsorship.

He has now resolved the first of those issues with the switch to the third week in May which for several years has been the preserve of the Deutsche Bank-TPC of Europe.

It was yesterday described as “a prime date” by the European Tour.

“A great opportunity for the Irish Open to attract some of the leading players on the Tour” is how O’Toole greeted the news.

With the future of the country’s flagship tournament at stake, it is to be ardently hoped that both are correct in their assessment. It remains to be seen, though, whether Irish golfing fans will be as enthusiastic so early in the season as they have been later in the year when they have invariably supported the national Open in large numbers.

On the other hand, there is little doubt that the quality of the field will be considerably enhanced by the move, with Colin Montgomerie presumably one of the first to sign up.

George O’Grady, who replaces Ken Schofield as executive director of the Tour at the end of this year, said: “the Irish Open has always occupied a special place on the European Tour and the combination of a new date and venue is a positive step forward for this wonderful championship.

“The month of May has always been one of the premier slots on Tour.”

Carton House is one of the country’s most spectacular 36-hole developments. The first course on the 1,100 acre estate there was designed by the American Mark O’Meara and is very much a standard parkland layout.

Colin Montgomerie, however, was handed a different brief when commissioned to lay out what the owners, the Mallahan family, would like to regard as “an inland links” with a myriad of little pot bunkers similar to Ballybunion and Lahinch.

But it is an extremely stern test as well - as the competitors in this year’s AIB Irish Amateur Open discovered. The winner, Welshman Craig Smith, finished one over par.