Scottish golf in transition: Montgomerie

Colin Montgomerie has lamented the state of Scottish professional golf and the lack of emerging young talent from the country where the game began.

Speaking on Wednesday at the DLF Golf and Country Club near Delhi, where the eight-time European Tour Order of Merit winner is competing this week at the Johnnie Walker Classic, Montgomerie described golf in his home country as being in a state of perpetual transition.

“I think we’re going through a transition (in golf). We’ve been going through a transition for 30 years, like our rugby team,” said the 44-year-old.

“We never come out of it, really. Our transition with football is the same.

“At least golf, I suppose, I’ve managed to play on the Ryder Cup team for the last few times so at least I have some representation. And if I don’t play this year, we might not have a representative, well, for the first time in modern history, so we’ve got to get going.”

Montgomerie feels that Scottish golfers are not measuring up well against their counterparts from the other home countries.

“There are Scottish golfers coming through but not to the same degree as the other home countries – the Irish and Welsh and English have more coming through.

“We have some but there’s no one particularly coming through. My partner at the World Cup which we won in China, Marc Warren, springs to mind. He’s got great potential, only 26 years old.

“He’s the best of the bunch, and let’s hope we can have more of his talent coming through.”

The Scot’s mood was lightened somewhat when a reporter mistakenly labelled young Ulsterman Rory McIlroy as a Scottish player with great potential.

“Unfortunately, he’s Irish,” Montgomerie responded cheekily. “Irish and Scots are pretty close so we could sort of transfer him across because he’s very good.

“He’s got great potential but he’s Irish I’m afraid.”

Buoyed by his good performance last week at the Accenture Matchplay Championship, where he reached the third round before going out to eventual runner-up Stewart Cink, Montgomerie is seeking another strong showing in India to help him regain his place in the world top-50 and earn a berth at the US Masters.

“This is the reason I’m playing, really, for the next few weeks, to gain as many world ranking points as possible.

“I gained a few last week and moved up from 62 to 54 and I’ve got more to do this week to try and get in the top-50 and stay there when the cut-off for the US Masters comes.

“It’s the only (major) tournament I’m not playing in so I need to get in that, because I’m a great believer if you’re not playing in the tournament, you can’t win.”