TV VIEW: Nick Faldo stood grinning like a fool. Faldo, we all used to dislike. A few wives too many. Too, surly and self-centred. Too successful with all of those Masters and British Open titles. The perfect professional. Hate that, writes Johnny Watterson

But Faldo at Loch Lomond was a boy in need of his hair being stroked because Faldo, the once invincible serial tournament winner, is now Nick the middle- aged former champion in search of a once great golf game.

The Loch Lomond Scottish Open had a few on view. Sandy Lyle was also there and on Saturday he was in contention at the beginning of the day, when we saw the Lyle of old, and was out of contention at the end of the day when we saw the Lyle of the past ten years.

Faldo, grinning like Scooby Doo on a charm offensive, seemed comfortable with his repositioning in the golfing market and spoke of his children's development programme in golf.

"What do you look for in young players?," asked the BBC's Steve Ryder "I look for fundamentals," said Faldo, smiling like a toothpaste model.

"You can do that looking in a mirror and practising. But I find the kids always just want to hit the ball has hard as possible. And that's okay, you gotta hit it hard these days.

"But I say to them they can hit it as hard as they like only if they finish totally in balance. Only then will I let them have a go at it."

Lyle was not even smirking, with his yin and yang a little off balance. But for a while it looked like the BBC had mistakenly put on an old reel, as the Scot was oddly chasing the leader, Sweden's Fredrik Jacobson, at 10 under par.

The dapper commentary of Peter Alliss was wishing Lyle well, as you would any player who had inexplicably lost a decade of their golfing career.

"Not a top three for 10 years on the European Tour. Well, I never. Golf, ahh golf. It's a funny old game," said the occasionally grief-stricken Alliss. "They're all willing Sandy on."

The soft homespun wisdoms of Alliss and the reality checks of the less nostalgic Australian Wayne Grady gave an expansive, soft focus account of Lyle's lost years as well as the brutal reality of the player's recurring bad dream.

"Unfortunately, what we thought was going to be a great day for Sandy has turned out to be a nightmare," remarked Grady as the former Major winner hit a bunker with an eight iron, put the sand shot into the rough, fluffed that shot, then sent the ball hurtling past the hole only to miss the return putt. Double bogey. His second.

People care about Lyle, and now they care about the one-time anti-hero Faldo. Once great and now fallen, their minor tragedies playing out in the spotlight of the European Tour turn people on.

The washer-board stomached Swedes with their clownish trousers and spray-on polo shirts and the waves of technically good, long-hitting British golfers have a lot to achieve before their careers can tell a story like Faldo or Lyle. They have yet to discover.

For the two old masters it is a voyage of rediscovery which looks now to be taking them far beyond golf courses, even far beyond golf itself.

Lyle's Saturday afternoon agony had to be broken. Three hours of slow cuts is hard to take when what you are seeking is a quick rush. Cricket is not normally the drug of choice. But hey, occasionally you think to yourself "okay, Murdoch is getting my money. Bummer. But look what I'm getting back".

By the time Sandy's head had dropped into his chin and the dark shades and visor had begun to mask the gathering thunderclouds around his face, India had just been put into bat in the Natwest Series final.

Forget everything you don't know about cricket. India had to hit 326 runs off 300 balls, or, 6.52 runs an over to beat England.

It was like asking Lyle to shoot a 65. Then, Lyle isn't 21 years old and called Mohammad Kaif. The greenhorn came in at 146 for 5 and left whirling his bat around his head as India inched to 326 runs in the highest scoring one-day Test match ever played in England.

Lyle's gloom had descended on Lord's. The English captain, Nasser Hussain, was a changing scene of unbridled confidence slowly crumbling into panic and finally despair as the Kaif-inspired knock came down to India needing 20 runs from 20 balls, six runs from seven balls, two runs from four balls.

"It's not easy chasing 325," said the understated batsman after he stepped up to take his man-of-the-match award. Grinning like a mid-life Nick Faldo, Kaif then joined the Indian team on their lap of honour.

An exciting cricket match. Whatever next, Mr Murdoch ?