IN THESE interesting financial times, not many in the world of golf have escaped unscathed. But some are inevitably surviving better than others. Take Andrew 'Chubby' Chandler, former tour player and now one of the game's most successful agents. Today, 20 years on from its relatively humble inception, Chandler's International Sports Management represents the likes of Ernie Els, Rory McIlroy, Lee Westwood, Darren Clarke and, remarkably, the winners of the last four European Tour
All of which makes Chandler a man worth listening to when it comes to the ins and outs and ups and downs of life on tour. On and off the fairway, there isn't much he hasn't seen or done. And there is even less on which he is unable to offer an inform
ed opinion. Half an hour with Chubby is long enough to cover almost every aspect of the game he has played and been associated with all his working life.
We start with the European Tour in the wake of the recently announced 25 per cent reduction in prize money and bonus payments for the inaugural 'Race to Dubai' that will conclude in the Middle East next month.
"The Race to Dubai has been fantastic, even if no-one has given it any credit," contends Chandler. "Numbers one (Westwood) and two (McIlroy) are going to be fighting it out to the end and will play exactly the same schedule between now and the climax. Martin Kaymer and Paul Casey will be in there too. The last five weeks are going to get better and better because these are the very best European players. There are no flukes up there."
Still, such a rosy view is hardly typical of Chandler's overall take on the job executive director George O'Grady and his team are doing from the tour's Wentworth base. Much, he says, could be improved.
"The European Tour has never spent enough time talking to the leading agents," he continues. "I hardly ever hear from them. They seem to view us as 'the other side'. Which is ridiculous. I wouldn't expect them to do everything I want them to do. But they should be listening to everyone and pooling the ideas.
"The European Tour is made up of tournaments, promoters, players, managers, press, caddies; there are a lot of components. But there is far too much of an 'us and them' situation. For years I've been telling George to form a board of directors taken from the business world. He should be using the people who love golf and would do it for nothing just to help the game.
"A board of directors is supposed to give direction to the management. But at the moment they have people who are not as clever as the managers giving the directions. That doesn't work. My board of directors are all people who are either cleverer than me or are accomplished in a different field. I use them all to expand my breadth of knowledge. I lean on them and George should do the same with his board. But he can't do that right now. His board is full of golfers."
One area where things have not moved along to Chandler's complete satisfaction is in the area of inter-tour cooperation. An opportunity, he feels, has been missed. "The financial crisis gave the European Tour a chance to get together with other tours around the world, apart from the PGA Tour of course. When everybody was struggling, that was the time to have a go as a global partnership. There were gaps in the schedule.
"In fact, such a possibility might still be viable, especially as guys at the lower end are looking around for places to play. If you look at those who have come off the Challenge Tour or through the qualifying school, hardly any will get a chance to play for the rest of this European Tour season. To me, that means there was a place for, say, three Japanese co-sanctioned events. There are going to be some very good players not playing in Singapore and Shanghai, for example. Look at Ross McGowan. He won a tournament two weeks ago and he isn't in either event at the moment. So it's not like any co-sanctioned events wouldn't get decent players."
Significantly, PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem seems to be aware of the possible opportunities on offer in Asia as a whole. Very soon, the former Washington lobbyist will spend as many as 18 days touring the region. It is safe to assume he isn't going so far and for so long for nothing.
Where Finchem's possible plans for expansion may fall down, however, is in the traditional reluctance of his members to board aircraft carrying their passports. "Finchem's doing the right thing, but I just don't see it happening," shrugs Chandler. "Take Korea, where I went with Rory earlier this year. If Finchem arranged a co-sanctioned event there, he'd get maybe five per cent of his players showing up. Nothing has changed in that respect. Americans are wary of going to what they see as 'difficult' countries. So Finchem would have to come up with a run of events that made sense. They are not going to fly to, say, Hong Kong for just the one week."
For the moment, however, Chandler – like the rest of us – is looking forward to the next few weeks and the burgeoning battle between Westwood and McIlroy for the money title. He's strictly neutral, but you get the sneaking feeling that he wouldn't be overly bothered if the much younger McIlroy ended up in second place. For Westwood, a winner last week for the first time in two years, has seen the dark side of life on tour. Once fourth in the world, the 36-year old Englishman plummeted well into three-figures before fighting his way back to the near top. Twice in the last 16 months he has lost major championships by a single shot.
"Portugal was massive for Lee to win," beams Chandler. "For about a year now I've been in his head about being too aggressive when in contention. He had forgotten, but when he won all those events early in his career, he didn't win them all; some people lost them. So I have been on him to be a bit more conservative down the stretch."
As for Westwood's nearest rival, like everyone else who has seen him play, Chandler is a massive McIlroy fan.
"Rory is a little ahead of schedule at the moment," he admits. "He needs to have more practise at winning. He needs to be in the shake-up on Sunday afternoons more often. That was why we took him to Korea recently. I wanted to see him in with a chance of winning on another continent. He's an unbelievable ball-striker. There's a bit of improvement to come in his putting, but his short game is very good. And, most important, his head is great. He gets 'it'. He understands what his job is all about."
The same, of course, can be said of the man handling his affairs. If nothing else, Chubby knows golf.
