The Open’s Greatest Snub: Why Golf’s Best Courses Remain Championship Orphans
After 35 years covering professional golf—and having walked every inch of dozens of championship venues as a caddie and correspondent—I’ve developed a fairly reliable nose for spotting when the golf world gets something fundamentally wrong. And folks, we’ve got ourselves a doozy.
The R&A has gifted us a fascinating puzzle hidden in plain sight: some of the planet’s most extraordinary links courses will likely never host The Open Championship, not because they lack the pedigree or the playability, but because they commit the cardinal sin of being logistically inconvenient. It’s a reality that deserves more than a shrug and a move on.
The Inconvenient Truth About Links Excellence
Let me be direct: Royal County Down shouldn’t be ranked outside the world’s top five courses and still be barred from hosting a Major. I played there last summer for the first time in my life, and I immediately understood why locals speak of it with an almost religious reverence. The Mourne Mountains backdrop isn’t just scenery—it’s a character defining the entire experience. The front nine alone compares to anything I’ve witnessed in four decades of golf journalism.
What strikes me most acutely is this: we’ve accepted a system where infrastructure and merchandise logistics trump pure championship merit. Listen to how the source frames it:
“There might be roadblocks and a lack of merchandise options (never a bad thing) but the courses themselves are all among the best on the planet.”
That parenthetical remark contains a quiet radicalism. The writer is essentially saying what many in golf circles think but rarely state publicly—maybe the circus doesn’t need to be quite so elaborate. Maybe fewer merchandise tents and easier logistics would actually be better for the game’s soul.
The Romantic Highlands vs. The Corporate Machine
Royal Dornoch presents an even more compelling case study. Positioned roughly 80 miles from Inverness in one of Scotland’s most remote and beautiful regions, Dornoch represents everything The Open should theoretically celebrate: a genuine links experience unmarred by commercial convenience. The course is practically a sermon in golf design—the opening holes flow with such natural elegance that you can barely believe humans laid them out at all.
In my experience covering tour events, I’ve noticed something interesting about players’ reactions to remote venues. There’s less griping about accommodations than you’d expect. Why? Because isolation creates focus. Players aren’t distracted by the circus. They’re simply competing.
Yet here’s where I think the R&A’s thinking becomes genuinely problematic: they’re optimizing for spectator access and corporate hospitality when they should be optimizing for championship golf. Those are not always the same thing.
Ireland’s Open Opportunity—And Why It Matters
Now, the article pivots toward something genuinely significant: the possibility of The Open leaving the British Isles for the first time. Portmarnock in Ireland emerges as the leading candidate, with 2030 a realistic target.
“At last year’s Open the outgoing chief executive Martin Slumbers explained that they would be supportive of the club asking the Government for help in putting together a case for taking The Open outside the UK for the first time ever.”
This represents a seismic shift in how the R&A approaches tradition versus expansion. I’ve covered enough golf politics to know this doesn’t happen casually. The fact that senior leadership is publicly, diplomatically opening this door suggests serious internal conversations have already occurred.
Portmarnock deserves consideration. It’s a natural, fair test that wouldn’t require the championship to compromise its values. But here’s my honest take: if the R&A is going to finally move The Open across the Irish Sea, they should consider whether Ballybunion or Lahinch might be equally worthy. The article mentions Ballybunion in passing:
“Ballybunion is certainly different, mixing elements of quirkiness with old-school charm and it’s so much fun. Again, the chances of The Open coming here are zero but that shouldn’t stop us dreaming.”
That resignation—”the chances are zero”—bothers me. It shouldn’t be zero. A course that “all the fun of Kingsbarns but with more of a natural landscape” deserves better than permanent exile.
The Broader Championship Calendar Crisis
What genuinely concerns me about The Open’s current trajectory is the calendar gap the article references: Birkdale hosts in 2024, St Andrews in 2027, and then… nothing confirmed. Muirfield and Turnberry want back on the rotation, but neither is moving until they’ve addressed their respective historical baggage.
This is where vision matters. The R&A has an opportunity to look at courses like Royal Porthcawl—which has successfully hosted three Senior Opens and even recently held a Women’s Open—and recognize that they’ve already proven their championship mettle. Instead, we’re waiting for the next iteration of safe, established venues.
Having caddied for Tom Lehman in the ’90s and watched how courses stepped up when given the chance, I can tell you this: great championship golf doesn’t require a specific zip code or a predetermined list. It requires great courses, fair testing conditions, and genuine competition. Most of the venues in this article deliver all three.
The Path Forward
I don’t think the R&A is making cynical decisions here—I think they’re being cautious. After 150 years of tradition, caution makes sense. But caution can calcify into stagnation.
The courses outlined here—Royal County Down, Royal Dornoch, Ballybunion, North Berwick, Kingsbarns, Royal Porthcawl, and Portmarnock—represent golf at its most authentic. They’re ranked among the world’s best for good reason. The question isn’t whether they’re championship-worthy. It’s whether golf’s governing body is willing to prize championship golf over championship convenience.
That’s a conversation worth having. And it might be the most important one happening in professional golf right now.
