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he 150th Open Championship, Muirfield’s first running of The AIG Women’s Open, a Senior Open staged at one of the most scenic and historic of all Scotland’s courses… One thing’s for sure, 2022 will be a year that will go down in the history of golf in the UK. In our excitement, though, we should not forget to take a quick glance around the metaphorical corner to see what is in store for next year. The Open will be heading to Royal Liverpool. Easily accessible for millions, the venue is a huge favourite with golf fans – around 230,000 people visited to watch Tiger Woods in imperious form when the course hosted its first Open for 39 years in 2006. The Championship also came to this corner of the northwest in 2014, when Rory McIlroy emerged as a worthy and very popular winner. England will also be the venue for the AIG Women’s Open, which will be taking place for the first time at Walton Heath Golf Club in Surrey. You could hardly wish for a more historic venue. Founded in
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1903, the club’s first captain was the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII). Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and David Lloyd George were members and five-time Open Champion James Braid was the long-standing professional. Not only that, and perhaps pertinent to its role next year, in 1912 the course was the venue for a 72-hole “Man versus Woman Challenge match” in which Cecil Leitch defeated twotime Open Champion Harold Hilton 2/1. Leitch would go on to win the Women’s Amateur Championship on four occasions (as well as five French Ladies Amateur Championships). The Senior Open meanwhile will be going west – to Wales and Royal Porthcawl, a course that was dubbed “absolutely spectacular” by former world number one and 1992 Masters champion, Fred Couples. Opened in the 1890s and South Wales’ first-ever 18-hole course, Royal Porthcawl will be welcoming The Senior Open for the third time, having hosted the Championship previously in 2014 and 2017. Bernhard Langer was victorious on both those occasions and, knowing the German maestro’s peerless record in this event, he will no doubt be one of the favourites again in 2023.
Dates for the diary Scotland passes the golfing baton to England and Wales next year – as the UK’s premier golf Championships head to three compelling venues Words: Angus MacDonald
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Royal Liverpool: an arena to challenge the best in the world
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