Bob's your uncle

There are managers out there who pore over golf magazines and internet sites in the weeks leading up to the start of the Golf Masters, studying the form of players and looking up their past records at particular tournaments in the hope that they can assemble a team good enough to win them a fourball at Mount Juliet. We know, we speak to them every week. One of the favoured ploys is to enter teams designed for specific tournaments, for example, one made up of as many Swedes as one can muster with the Scandinavian Masters in mind, or another comprising a half dozen Spaniards (plus one Irishman) aimed at the Spanish Open (the theory being they might know the course, they're close to home and they can stay with their Ma instead of in an impersonal, five-star hotel).

So far, we have to report, this particular approach hasn't reaped fourball rewards for many managers through the Golf Masters' five year history. Cindy Pender, for one, had no luck so far this year with any of the carefully picked teams she entered. "Nowhere to be seen," she said of their whereabouts in the competition.

But she also entered a team by the name of Bobs Plus One, made up, "for the fun of it", of six golfers (plus one) by the name of Robert (or Bob). Ring, ring. "Cindy, you've won yourself a fourball." "Huh, so much for the scientific approach," she said.

Indeed. Take a bow Robert(s) Tway, May, Estes, Karlsson, Allenby and Damron, plus the one, Padraig Harrington. The most successful of the Bobs in week 23 were Messrs Tway (tied for second at the Buick Open) and May (joint third at the Scandinavian Masters), with Estes (fifth in America) and Karlsson (who took a share of fifth in Malmo) outscoring fellow Bobs Allenby and Damron, who won less than £4,000 between them. Honorary "Bob" Harrington brought the team total to £257,139, clinching our Dublin manager a day out at Mount Juliet.