In 2019, Royal Portrush hosting Open was huge for Northern Ireland. This year, it'll be bigger

USA Today

3 days ago

About this time last year, I wrote a column celebrating my 25th Open in a working capacity. It turned out to be a load of cobblers. The statistic, that is, not the column. Then again?
Anyway, I'd forgotten, you see, about the cancellation of the 2020 championship due to the COVID pandemic, so it was only 24.
This week, then, is my actual silver jubilee, so one presumes that the good folk at the R&A have commissioned a limited-edition range of commemorative tea towels, porcelain thimbles and decorative hinged trinket boxes to mark the occasion.
I'll have an amble over to the Royal Portrush merchandise tent to check out the shimmering wares later in the week.
Part of this column was composed yesterday in the shadow of a wonderful, awe-inspiring edifice of maritime magnificence. Yes, that's right. The check-in terminal of the Stena Line ferry at Cairnryan.
The Scottish golf writers went in two by two? Well, we tried to do it in an orderly fashion but, because this correspondent was running late, the embarking process descended into a nautical nonsense that featured the kind of flustered bellows and tortured grunts that Noah probably had to deal with as he tried to shepherd the last few biblical beasts up his bloomin' gangplank.
We made it, though. It's going to be a busy old week here on the Antrim coast. Back in 2019, the last time The Open was staged at Portrush, the tickets for the championship days were gobbled up in the time it took you to say, 'tickets for the championship days have gone on sale.'
It was the first-ever sold-out Open. That wasn't surprising, of course. Portrush hadn't staged the championship since 1951. It was a hugely significant moment for Northern Ireland after a troubled past.
I always recall an Irish colleague observing the giddy scene six years ago and writing, 'When Darren Clarke steps to the tee at Royal Portrush at 6:35 am and gets the Open underway, he will become the first Northern Irishman to fire a shot here and have it universally welcomed.'
The masses lapped it up. 'It will be mayhem, but merry, Irish mayhem, which is the best kind,' said the late, great Peter Alliss, who played in The Open when it first came to this parish back in '51. He was right.
Here in 2025, there will be an additional 40,000 spectators flooding through the gates with a total of 278,000 people expected over the course of the week.
It will be the second-highest attended Open in history after the 290,000 souls who shoehorned themselves into St Andrews in 2022. I hope there are enough of my 25th anniversary dish cloots on sale for the masses to purchase as a keepsake?
The infrastructure these days is as big and as bold as you would expect from a sporting and corporate beast that constantly grows arms and legs.
A hierarchy has developed in terms of Open venues as the organisers look more favourably at hosts that can easily accommodate the 200,000-plus mark.
That we're back at Portrush within just six years speaks volumes for the R&A's mantra of the bigger, the better.
This emphasis on how many punters they can cram in gently elbows certain esteemed courses into the margins. That's a pity for some truly magnificent venues.
To be honest, I find an Open almost too big for my liking. But maybe I'm just getting on in years? Each to their own, eh?
In the build-up to the eagerly anticipated 2019 showpiece, I had a sit down with a lovely gentleman called Ian Bamford, who was a young 'un back in 1951 and went on to become an Irish Amateur champion and a great, cherished doyen of Royal Portrush Golf Club.
'I still remember queuing to watch a western at the cinema that week and was in touching distance of Dai Rees and Norman Von Nida,' reflected Bamford of a couple of well-known golfers who were killing a bit of time.
I'm not sure we'll see Rory McIlroy or Scottie Scheffler popping into the Portrush Playhouse. The past is a different world.
'When Royal Portrush was founded in 1888, there were only 1,600 people in the town,' noted Bamford. 'There were four pubs and four churches.'
Given the volume of bodies in town over the next few days, the queue to get a libation at the Harbour Bar will probably stretch to the Giants Causeway. I may have better luck in the church?
The final major of the men's season is upon us already as the season hurtles by at a furious rate of knots. I find the condensed nature of the global golf schedule a trifle unsatisfactory.
When the Claret Jug is handed out on Sunday, it'll be nine months until the Masters. At least there's a Ryder Cup in September to fill part of this void
Once the prolonged wait for Augusta is over, the majors come at us thick and fast in a crash, bang, wallop configuration that does them something of a disservice in a jam-packed scene. There's barely a moment to draw breath.
Come Sunday night, the men's majors will have passed in a flash again. As my 25 years at The Open prove, time really does fly.
Now, where's my celebratory tea towel?
Nick Rodger is a correspondent for The Scotland Herald, which is owned by Newsquest/Gannett.