GOLF: Newsflash - Golf CAN be exciting...

Any reader who has more than a passing acquaintance with the game of golf will quite easily tell that the writer of this article knows very little about the sport. Calling golf a sport is likely to cause many of the non-golfers reading this to laugh at such a label. To those who do not play or follow golf, it may seem no more sporty than darts or tiddlywinks (although the writer would like to say that the former of these is definitely a sport of kings while the latter, well, he is unsure if he has even spelled it correctly.)

And with that somewhat bizarre introduction, I would like to put forward the following argument; golf can be one of the most exciting sports on the planet.

The only golf tournament in the calendar which I watch in its entirety, or at least as much as I possibly can, is the Ryder Cup. The Europe vs USA rivalry, with its tactics, choice of pairings and captain's press conferences has me hooked. But when it comes to the other tournaments, even the Majors, as they are called, I only watch a few hours if any. But these few hours are often gripping.

And so, as I sat down in front of the TV on Sunday night, I switched on BBC Two, relatively uninformed as to what had gone on in the first 3 1/2 days of the 4 day Masters from Augusta in the US. The first scene was Tiger Woods, paired with his arch-rival Phil Mickelson, both of whom were making a strong push up the leaderboard. It looked like Chad Campbell, leader for a good portion of the tournament, Angel Cabrera and 48 year old Kenny Perry might be pipped at the post by Tiger or the left-handed Mickelson.

But a couple of dropped shots by both Woods and Mickelson on the final few holes, meant that the race was down to three; Perry, Cabrera and Campbell. And as for me, I was hooked. The demise of Woods may well have had the lukewarm golf fans switching off, but I was in for the long haul. I knew it would be midnight before this contest was sorted out.

Cabrera and Perry were the final pair, meaning they would be the last to finish, so Chad Campbell would be back in the hut by the time the other two were finishing. When Kenny Perry holed his putt for a birdie at the 16th hole, I was ready to go to bed. It was over. Perry had a two shot lead with two holes to play.

But it is not as easy as that as I have discovered on a number of occasions. Golf has the habit of creating Zeros out of Heroes at the swish of a club. Almost unlike any other sport, the man at the top of the leaderboard in a big golf tournament, can, with one bad shot, undo all of his hard work in the previous 15 hours spent on the course (or more like 20 hours the rate some of the golfers saunter around the course these days).

And so, Kenny Perry, with an inevitability that still does not detract from the tension created, proceeded to drop shots at the final two holes, handing his playing partner, Angel Cabrera, who had held his nerve superbly on the last couple of holes, as well as Chad Campbell the chance in a three way play-off. For those unfamiliar with golf, this is a sudden-death penalty shoot-out style finish, where extra holes are played until someone comes out victorious. Cabrera held his nerve, and the Argentinian denied what had been a leaderboard full of Americans on the final day.

Great finishes are possible in all sports, whether it is a team sport or an individual one. But the latter stages of golf tournaments are truly gripping. One can watch the back nine of the final round of the Masters without having seen the previous 63 holes, and it still makes for exciting, edge-of-your-seat stuff. Sometimes in other sports, missing over three-quarters of the action is a serious hindrance. But not here. If you have never watched the final couple of hours of a major golf tournament, then look out for one in the future; you will not regret it.