The men to keep at swing length on the golf course.

Ah, late July – that time of the year when the sun is out, fairways are parched and golf, for once, is the main event on newspapers’ back pages. Clubs are retrieved from the back of sheds and garages, creaking backs are massaged, and every type of golfer – from hopeful hackers to sweet-swinging scratch handicappers – heads out to try emulating the big boys bossing it at The Open. Golfers come in every shape, size and political persuasion, of course – and on any given day, on any given course, you will likely spot every genus at play.

Young, slim, tanned, and preternaturally cocky (very possibly because he’s bankrolled by Daddy), the wannabe pro will be familiar to every golfer. There’s the white belt with the big buckle that he always wears, the silly haircut (with highlights, tramlines or a surfeit of gel, depending on whatever’s in vogue on the PGA Tour), and his inveterate faddism. His latest affectations are carrying alignment sticks in his golf bag and wearing Apple AirPods while practising – only because he’s seen his favourite player doing both. All he does is play golf, which has left him with a ridiculous cap tan – bottom half mahogany; area above his eyebrows, the pallor of a corpse. He plays very slowly, again because this is what he’s seen on TV, and he thinks he’s a lot better than he is. Destined to end up working in telemarketing.

Nobody is quite sure when he joined the club, though the clever money is pre-Boer War. The old buffer is a reactionary who sees change of any kind as an assault on his very being. He snorts audibly when women and juniors enter the clubhouse, he uses the same persimmon woods that he bought in the mid-1950s, and he still wears golf shoes with tassels on. His trolley has thin wheels, like those on old-fashioned prams, and he considers wearing shorts on the golf course to be on a par with infanticide. His nasal hair has grown to such an extravagant length that it could now be used to darn the holes in the same moth-eaten sweaters he’s been wearing for decades. The old buffer insists on playing with the same three octogenarian members every week, and never calls anyone through. All three privately grumble about his creative accountancy when it comes to his scorecard.

You can hear him before you see him as he roars into the golf club car park in his sports car, which he then parks as close as possible to the clubhouse so everyone can admire it. The flash Harry dresses in lurid, branded golf wear that is designed for men half his age, and is the first to buy the latest and most expensive equipment. He does not have many friends, and sits in the same corner of the bar where he drinks and laughs loudly with the club professional. This is chiefly because the club pro is acutely aware of how much he spends with him on golf lessons, bad clothes and clubs he’s not skilled enough to use. The flash Harry desperately wants to be club captain, and is prepared to buy off members of the committee if necessary. The inappropriate comments he continually makes to female members will likely work against him.

This guy could have gone pro had he not discovered the joys of alcohol as a junior member. He’s indulged and admired in equal measure by his fellow members, mainly because he’s a good guy at heart and is still capable of knocking it round in under par when in a state of (very) advanced inebriation. The wasted talent never practices – never has, never will – and yet his name is splashed across every prize board in the clubhouse. He’ll win the club championship despite having spent the previous night asleep at a bus stop, and drops more at the bar than he does on his annual membership. When he was 16, he had a short but passionate affair with the club’s elderly barmaid, although he remains unaware that everyone knows this. Married five times, he now works part-time with the greenkeeping staff.

“All the gear but no idea” is a phrase that could have been coined for this guy. The kindest thing you can say about his swing is it looks like a giraffe falling down a spiral staircase. He’s only been playing for a couple of years – something he’s only too willing to share – but his unerring inability to hit a golf ball is bordering on the unique. Fellow members wear rictus smiles when they spy him standing on the first tee, and while some have tried to be encouraging, most fume about getting stuck behind him. The problems are he never knows when to pick his ball up and move on, he takes more practice swings than any other golfer in history, and he’s endlessly cheerful and enthusiastic. The latter makes him difficult to hate, although not impossible given the former.

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