Prior to the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, which came into being in 2001, Dunhill sponsored golf's 16-nation Dunhill Cup - a kind of world team championship - which was first played for in 1985. South Africa, however, only started competing in this team event in 1991 after a prolonged absence from international team sport because of the sporting boycott.
So, let's turn the clock back to October 10, 1991 and - after all the excitement of our return to the big-time - It’s day one of the 16-nation Dunhill Cup over the Old Course at St Andrews and the three-man SA line-up are, sadly for us, battling against golfing minnows Switzerland in the first round. David Frost has won his match but Gary Player has lost his making it 1-1.
So it’s up to John Bland, who is all square through 18 holes with a fellow by the name of Paolo Quirici. They both par the first extra hole but at No 2 “Blandy” gets into loads of trouble and needs to snake in a 30-footer with a big break on it for par just to avoid defeat. I am watching from the edge of the green, along with a small party of other South Africans. We’re rather gloomy, because it looks like Quirici might spoil a rather special moment for us. After all, for most of us it’s our first visit to the fabled home of golf and, after the long years of isolation we don’t want to be sent packing on day one. The only guy staying calm is a determined, never-say-die Bland who spectacularly finds the cup with the long putt to steal a half.
He goes on to win the next hole, South Africa are through to the quarter-finals and a wildly excited bunch of green and gold golf fans head for the popular Dunvegan Hotel pub, conveniently situated just 112 yards from the Old Course, for some celebratory pints (while Bland strolls over to the Old Course Hotel alongside the Road Hole 17th for a cup of tea, because that’s what he drinks most of the time). Next day, Friday, the haar (thick fog) rolls in off the North Sea and there’s no play.
Sunday dawns bright and clear and it’s a day to remember for South Africa because Player, “Frostie” and Bland topple the USA Dream Team of Fred Couples, Curtis Strange and Jerry Pate. South Africa are back on the international golf map, and we then whitewash the highly-rated Scotland team of Sam Torrance, Gordon Brand Jnr and Colin Montgomerie
in the semi-finals.
It’s a pity that the golfing Boks had to then lose, by a narrow margin, to Sweden in the final. But South Africa – Ernie Els, Retief Goosen and Frost doing duty in each instance – would go on to win the Dunhill Cup in 1997 (beating Sweden in the final) and 1998 (toppling Spain).
In 2001 the Dunhill Cup made way for the now flourishing $5-million Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, which besides the 72-strokeplay event for the pros, has a separate pro-am for famous celebrities and sporting greats from other codes.
Our own Johann Rupert is the driving force behind it, and at first it was met with derision by a sceptical British print media. But the Alfred Dunhill Links has grown into one of the most sought-after stops in world golf.
Independent Media