A Quick 18 with Peter Alliss
The Open returns to Royal Portrush this year for only the second time since 1951. Peter Alliss played that year, but while he admits he doesn't remember much about it, having missed the cut comfortably, he believes this could go down as one of the most memorable championships of all time.
Seve Foundation to benefit from €50,000 Heritage Challenge Pro-Am in 2016
The spirit of Seve Ballesteros and the magnificent qualities of the course he designed with Jeff Howes will be on show for all to see when the Heritage Resort and the PGA in Ireland stage the sixth annual Heritage Challenge Pro-Am in association with the Seve Ballesteros Foundation from 4-5 June 2016.
Bjorn: "If we don’t grow the tour with Asia and South Africa we’re going to struggle against the Web.com tour"
Thomas Bjorn insists that the European and Asian Tours will not be treading on the memory of the late Seve Ballesteros by ignoring his pleas and staging the inaugural Eurasia Cup in Malaysia next month.
Where the Ryder Cup was won and lost
Sergio Garcia and Ian Poulter celebrate Europe’s Ryder Cup victory. Photo Colum Watts/www.golffile.ieThe Seve Factor
No-one made the seemingly impossible look easy like Seve Ballesteros. The great Spanish golfing matador, who passed away in May last year, was certainly in Chicago in spirit as Europe made an epic recovery to win on the final day.
Shades of Seve as Javier Ballesteros dedicates opening 65 to Dad
Javier Ballesteros in action. Picture by Fernando Herranz (El Mundo Deportivo)A picture is worth a thousand words and this image of Javier Ballesteros says it all. The 21-year old amateur made his debut in a pro event at the same course where his late father Seve took his first steps on the road to golfing immortality, Sant Cugat, 38 years ago.
And the young law student did so brilliantly, dedicating his five under 65 to his father as he trailed first round leader Ivo Giner by just three strokes in the Alps Tour’s Peugeot Alps de Barcelona.
"Captaincy? I want to play the 2018 Ryder Cup" - Harrington
Colin Montgomerie was 47 when he captained the Ryder Cup team in 2010. Padraig Harrington wants to be a Ryder Cup player at the same age. Credit: Golffile.iePadraig Harrington insists his goal is to play in the 2018 Ryder Cup at the age of 47.
The struggling Dubliner has been tipped as a potential European skipper in Paris in seven years’ time. But he believes he is about to play the best golf of his life and sees no reason why he can’t aim for what could be his 10th Ryder Cup cap at Le Golf National.
"Seve was the Maradona of golf" - Diego
“You could say he is the Maradona of golf,” the Argentinian suggested. “The Tiger Woods phenomenon is more recent. I’m more of Seve’s era, he’s part of my generation along with other greats like [13 time world champion motorcyclist] Angel Nieto. You could say that we are from the same litter and that’s why our affection was mutual.”
"I held his hands and stroked them and thought: what these hands have done in the world"
It was an almost sacred ritual. Wiping away the tears that streamed down his cheeks, Baldomero Ballesteros undressed his brother Severiano’s body with an almost maternal gentleness and dressed him in his Sunday uniform - the white shirt, the same navy blue sweater and navy blue slacks that he had habitually worn on the final day of his greatest triumphs.
"Seve was golf's Elvis," says McGinley
Paul McGinley has described Seve Ballesteros as the Elvis Presley of golf
Speaking in Dublin recently McGinley said: "He means the same to me as he means to everybody. Growing up as a kid, watching him in the Irish Opens at Royal Dublin and Portmarnock, Seve was the one. He was the Elvis Presley of golf back then.
"It was a different world back then because we didn’t have golf on TV like we do nowadays and when you saw a superstar it had a different effect to seeing Tiger Woods now because you see Tiger every week on TV. It was a different era where you saw only half a dozen tournaments a year on TV. People look back at the Irish Open and think about it in the rose-tinted glasses kind of way. A lot of it was because golf and sport wasn’t exposed the way it is now."
Where now for Harrington?
Game Changer - A billboard at Glasgow Prestwick airport for Harrington's sponsors FTI.Just 12 months after scorching to third in the world by retaining the Claret Jug, the Dubliner is now 16th after his disappointing 65th place finish at Turnberry.And while he might be a cross between Bernhard Langer and Seve Ballesteros, the man who caddied for those major winning greats is not sure that Harrington is on the right track with his swing changes.
English legend Peter Coleman said: “Whether it is right or wrong, I don’t know. At present it doesn’t look like it’s that good but the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Let’s see when he comes through to the other side.
Seve - dreaming while he's awake
(First published on 11 October, 2005)
Seve Ballesteros has pulled off the impossible hundreds of time in his career. Now he’s determined to create another bit of history and snatch Des Smyth’s record by becoming the oldest winner in the history of the European Tour.
Few believe the Spanish maestro, 48, will ever regain even a glimmer of the form that brought him five majors and 72 tournament victories worldwide. But he remains convinced that he can lift a European Tour trophy once more - even if nobody else does.