Where to in 2012?

IN advocating what will seem a somewhat heretical suggestion, I am in no way denigrating either the current venue, Killarney, or the many other outstanding courses that have staged our national Open over the years.

In fact, the status of the championship owes much to the many great tournaments that have unfolded at the likes of Portmarnock and Royal Dublin, Mount Juliet and Druids Glen, Ballybunion and Baltray, Fota Island and Adare Manor — before we ever get to Killarney.

Significantly, though, there was a time back in the 1980s and 90s when PJ Carroll, the original and most benevolent and far-sighted of sponsors, felt it just didn’t make sense to move the event out of the greater Dublin area and it wasn’t until it spread its wings and moved to Killarney in 1991 that the country as a whole was allowed to embrace the event.