ON A memorable Sunday evening at Castle GC eight years ago, Philip Walton was celebrating a splendid victory in the Irish Professional Championship. The occasion took on much broader significance, however, when it was learned that his great rival, Ronan Rafferty, had just made a European Tour breakthrough by capturing the Italian Open.
Now, in an interesting exercise in role reversal, Walton is off to Brescia this week, while Rafferty has opted out of what had become a regular Italian Open appearance. All of which comes about because the Italian and Irish native championships no longer clash in the first week in May. In fact this year's Irish Championship has been put back to October, at Fota Island.
Apart from Rafferty, who always declined to play in his native championship, the Italian event has had regular Irish representation over the years. Indeed David Feherty won the title in 1986 and Padraig Harrington's share of 10th place last year became the springboard for a breakthrough victory in the Spanish Open a week later.
Still, this will be the first time for competitors such as Eamonn Darcy, Christy O'Connor Jnr, Walton and Darren Clarke to be in the same Italian line up. The Irish representation in Brescia will also include Harrington, Raymond Burns and David Higgins.
Predictably, Harrington remains the most active of Ireland's campaigners on the European scene this season, having played 11 out of a possible 13 tournaments. He is followed by Higgins (10); Burns (9), Rafferty and Paul McGinley (8 each), Des Smyth and Clarke (7 each), Walton and Darcy (5 each) and O'Connor (3).
As it happens, Harrington and Clarke are travelling in style these days. After last Sunday's Spanish Open, they were whisked by private jet for a two day assignment in Portugal. In the company of Seve Ballesteros, Ian Woosnam, Costantino Rocca and Thomas Bjorn, they played a pro am yesterday to mark the opening of the redesigned Villamoura I course.
The celebrations will continue with a six man greensome today after which five of them - Ballesteros is the exception - will head off to Brescia. In the same private jet, naturally.
Conscious of having lost ground recently in the battle for a Ryder Cup place, Clarke was especially active on the practice ground at La Moraleja last weekend, after missing the cut. "There was a time when I would have given anything to tee it up with Ollie (Jose Maria Olazabal) and Greg (Norman)," he said of the opening two rounds in Madrid. "But on this occasion, I couldn't wait for it to be over."
Clarke went on: "I've concluded that I allowed myself to get too bogged down in theory. So I decided to simplify things. My first move was to seek the advice of my manager, Chubby Chandler, and we did some very useful work together on the practice ground."
Though he has slipped to sixth place in the qualifying table, Clarke is fortunate in that none of those around him has made a significant move, though Mark James is now in 18th position. In fact, the newly crowned Spanish Open champion is only one place behind Harrington in 17th place, while the other leading Irish challenger, McGinley, is back in 24th place.
Interestingly, sudden death decided the destination of tournaments on both sides of the Atlantic last weekend. Indeed, like the play off defeat for Greg Norman in Madrid, there was also a sense of deja vu about the Greater Greensboro Classic at Forest Oaks, where victory went to New Zealander Frank Nobilo. As it happens, it was in this event in 1974 that the game's most illustrious Kiwi, Bob Charles, had his last US tour victory.
Nobilo displayed admirable courage and not a little skill when beating Brad Faxon, the man of the moment in American golf after a victory in New Orleans and runner up place to Nick Price in the MCI Classic at Harbour Town, already this month.
American commentators were tripping over themselves in praise of Vaxon's short game. So it was particularly revealing that at the first hole of sudden death the 435 yard 18th - Nobilo succeeded in getting the ball nearer the pin with a full sandwedge third shot (he had driven into heavy rough), than Faxon could achieve with a greenside chip.
In the event, the New Zealander holed from seven feet for a winning par alter the American had missed a 10 footer. And with all the talk about Faxon's putting, one was brought back to the Ryder Cup at Oak Hill in 1995.
There, his opponent. David Gilford, looked to have squandered a precious half point when an excellent, 10 foot putt on the 18th, was good enough only for a bogey five. But with a six footer to win the hole and halve the match, Faxon missed the putt.
Meanwhile, it was a magnificent effort by Nobilo, who proved his ability to handle US conditions when shooting a final round of 66 for a four shot victory over Scott Hoch, to retain the Sarazen World Open at Chateau Elan last November. Further evidence of his skills was to be found in 14 cuts out of a total of 18 US events, prior to his commitment to full time activity there, this season.
In the women's game, there was a notable triumph for the ever popular Nancy Lopez - her first in four years. It came in the $500,000 Chick-Fil-A Charity Championship at Stockbridge, Georgia which, like Greensboro, was also affected by rain.
As it happened conditions were so hostile that after unsuccessful attempts at completing the 54 hole event on Sunday, officials decided to declare Lopez the winner - over 36 holes. She was two strokes clear of Tina Barrett, Deb Richard and Karrie Webb and six ahead of Laura Davies.
"A win is a win," said Lopez afterwards. "Still, it bothers me a little bit to have won over 36 holes because I wanted to know how it felt again to experience the pressure coming up 18." One suspects that like all great players, however, Lopez wouldn't have forgotten how to get the job done.
Elsewhere in the US, Hale Irwin battled gusty winds and some putting problems before sinking a 15 foot birdie putt on the 18th, to capture the Las Vegas Senior Classic by one stroke from Isao Aoki.
