TGIF: Augusta, Austin, and the persevering spin of Tim May

I wrote earlier that professional golf was finding itself in turbulent times, with ongoing disputes between the PGA and LIV, player disharmony, and an across-the-board void in leadership.

Yes, agreed, that’s not breaking news. But the fact remains: the PGA Tour and LIV Golf spat continue to roll along, with both sides slinging mud, some sticking, and most missing their mark. Leadership from either side is nonexistent—isn’t the first and only rule of leadership being visible? And player disharmony, see below.

18 LIV contracted golfers competed at this year’s Masters. View the full list here.

Past Masters winners included: Phil Mickelson, Sergio Garcia, Dustin Johnson, Patrick Reed, Charl Schwartzel, and Bubba Watson. And other major champions: Cameron Smith, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, and Louis Oosthuizen.

You can dress it up however you like, the fact remains that this is an extremely capable group of golfers who should not be on the periphery of the sport. And do you think the two opposing tribes are playing nicely? Try this for where the players spat has gone too:

Brooks Koepka (T2) on Rory McIlroy missing the cut at The Masters,

“The only chance he (McIlroy) has of going to the Championship dinner is if he is the waiter.”

It should be noted that Koepka is also on the championship dinner waitlist! Is this where golf is? No doubt, Koepka, will have been taken out of context or his Twitter account hacked.

Not so chummy anymore - Koepka and McIlroy

Mischievously, I have images of Manuel, the waiter from Fawlty Towers, running around the dinner table spilling soup in Fred Ridley’s lap!

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So, with that being said, it's been a couple of weeks of TV golf at HQ.

Confined to the couch for extended periods, golf can be the perfect medicinal fix. Limited concentration required; monotoned commentary lulls you into a state of inertia, and there’s the dreaming part: I too can hit that shot or miss those three-footers!

Unsurprisingly, the Masters did its usual thing: promising plenty, delivering in the main, and then dropping you off like a high school date come Sunday evening.

Jon Rahm emerged as a deserving winner. Rahm had to manage early-late tee times, contending with the worst weather. His ten under 36 hole total was extraordinary given the conditions.

Come Sunday night Rahm had prevailed over an unlikely duo. Brooks Koepka made the early and middle running—he enjoyed the favourable side of the draw before eventually fading—in part due to the horrendous pace of play in front of him (Patrick Cantlay and Sam Bennett).

The other pursuer, Phil Mickelson, made a vintage Sunday run, carding a 65 with a 31-shot back nine. Nobody could have seen this coming except, of course, Phil the Thrill himself. A Mickelson victory? Who knows how that would have looked?

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The week before The Masters, Austin, Texas, hosted the World Golf Championship (WGC) Dell Technologies Match Play. Austin Country Club was the venue, an excellent course that straddles the Colorado River—yes, that’s the Colorado River, Texas!

So where does Tim May, the ex-Australian cricketer, fit in?

That’s Shane Warne with Tim May! Credit: CODE Sports

May calls Austin home now and has done so for some time. Happily retired with his wife and four children, May depicts Austin as "a wonderful city to live in," a sister city of Adelaide, where he grew up.

He talks of playing "a truckload of golf" and has an impressive 0.8 handicap. Austin Country Club is one of his regular haunts; it would be interesting to know where May sits on the PGA vs. LIV issues.

Outside of his impressive cricket CV—Shane Warne named May as his favourite spinner-in-arms—his legacy sits as the prominent Australian Cricketers Association boss who helped Australia’s elite players first command millionaire salaries.

My path crossed with May's in July 1993. Australia had just won the fourth Test of the Ashes series at Headingley, and much to their chagrin, they were summoned to Old Trafford to play a county game two days later.

Indirectly, May had helped to fill the pockets of some battling Lancashire youngsters that week, not to the same degree as Australia’s elite, but enough for me to think fondly of him now.

It’s fair to say the game would never have gotten to where it did if Australia had been fair dinkum. Tour games gave the tourists an opportunity for match practice; and a chance for fringe players to get some game time.

Batting first, Australia closed their first innings on 3–282, knowing they wanted to bat a second time. Lancashire replied with 7–250 declared, allowing Australia to bat again and set a last-innings chase of 220 odd.

Shane Warne doubled May’s overs in Lancashire’s first innings. 32 to 15.

In the fourth innings run-chase, the two spinners shared the workload, sending down 50 of the 60 overs bowled—a pretty generous declaration from the captain, Mark Taylor.

I say May helped Lancashire’s youngsters that week because he did.

During the run-chase, I watched continually—from the non-striker's end—May bowl over after over wide of John ‘Creepy’ Crawley’s off stump with a 5/4 off-side field. Clearly, May had not seen Creepy bat previously.

Creepy was a violent sweeper, with the spin or not, and was an excellent all-around player of spin. He feasted on the open leg side, and all May kept saying was "f*cking cowboy", choosing to keep his field the same. My job was easy; get off strike and smile lamely when his menacing glare came into view.

It felt like a ‘Jerry Maguire’ moment with Rod Tidwell: "Show me the money, baby."

We got the runs. Creepy made a hundred. And we were in the money, thanks in part to Tim May.

A brewery had put up a pot of money for the counties to play for in their games against the 1993 Australians. To that point, I’m pretty sure the Aussies had not lost a game on tour; the pot was to be shared by any team that beat them. Lancashire scooped the bloody pot. Divided by 12, it turned into the best payday of my modest career! Here’s the scorecard.

Of course, that cash is long gone. However, I do think fondly of Tim May whenever I hear his name mentioned. And I’m somewhat jealous of his golfing environs.

Have a great weekend, and as always, thank you for being here.