Golf clubs feeling strain as courses still out of bounds

GALWAY golf courses are closed again after a Covid disrupted 2020, leaving many under financial pressure with members seeking a reduction in subscriptions due to reduced playing times. The Connacht Tribune puts the spotlight on a sport bunkered for the third time in months.

THE game of golf took yet another hammering in County Galway in late December with the decision to close down clubs which has impacted on an estimated 10,000 members.

There are 16 golf clubs in the county and the vast majority have been struggling from a financial perspective for the past 10 months with a combination of closures and restricted activities within clubhouses.

Even though the weather conditions have not been conducive to golf over the past couple of weeks, the courses and clubhouses are again left deserted and, largely, through no fault of their own.

Golf club members across Galway, some who pay in excess of €1,000 for their annual subscriptions, believe  that they are  now being victimised by a situation that they are not responsible for.

And they are even more infuriated by the fact that so called ‘elite sports’ such as rugby and soccer can continue when golfers, who invariably are so far distanced from each other on the course that there is even less risk of spreading of the virus.

Golfers, who haven’t got much value for the annual sub during the course of 2020, are also annoyed that their governing body, Golf Ireland, have not put up a significant case to keep courses open.

Courses were forced to erect the ‘course closed’ on their gates on two occasions during the 2020 lockdowns and now there are vacant fairways since the latest restrictions have come into place with no knowledge of when they will be allowed reopen.

The Connacht Tribune have been told by several golf clubs across the county that they are looking at their membership being decimated even when they do eventually reopen.

They say that members feel frustrated that they haven’t got value for their membership during the various closures and may not renew their subscriptions unless there are significant discounts in place to entice them to return.

Members are also frustrated given that social distancing automatically happens whenever they are playing golf – unlike the scenes in the aftermath of PRO14 rugby clashes or even the recent GAA football and hurling series.

The Taoiseach announced that elite sport was being given the green light to continue as the country returned to Level 5, but there was no such latitude granted to golf clubs or tennis clubs whose members invariably participate in an event while keeping a substantial distance apart.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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