Links with past prove tenuous as iron man prevails

Caddie's Role: The 135th Open Championship - and the much-talked-about Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake is finally revealed to the world's best golfers.

MONDAY

It is the unknown quantity, the mystery course where the only yardstick is the 1967 Open. With the evolution of the game, it might have been 1867 for all it tells us about this year.

Brad Faxon played an amateur event here in 1983 but his memory of it is hazy. So if ever there was a level playing field this is it.

It's pretty flat too. For a links course it has very little undulation, which plays tricks when you try to judge distance. And it is parched from the drought.

Peter Dawson, secretary of the R&A, is out on the 13th green, watching in disbelief as his putt rolls uphill a long way past the hole. He cannot fathom it - which is alarming given he is responsible for the whole show. The holes filled in yesterday are shrinking and dying under a relentless sun. I hope they are going to turn the sprinklers on and leave them on; otherwise there will be no greens left by Thursday.

TUESDAY

The practice ground is on a public course about half a mile away. We are shuttled back and forth in courtesy cars. The players' hospitality marquee is a little bit out of the way so I jump into a courtesy car. The lady driver's face lights up when I inform her I caddie for Retief Goosen - but drops when I tell her he won't be joining me until later.

There seems to be much star-gazing with these volunteer drivers. The prospect of chauffeuring Tiger Woods for a couple of minutes is the lure for many.

We have an entourage at the Open. There are marshals assigned to follow us every day. We also have a bunker raker, a scorer, a standard bearer and, on the weekend, two rules officials. For many, volunteering to work in the Open is an annual tradition.

WEDNESDAY

After late practice rounds the past two days, based on the theory that if you are playing well in a Major you are going to have three late starts, Retief opts for the early time.

We tee it up with a young South African, Thomas Aiken, playing in his first Open. As we get on the tee, Tom Watson, who has won this event five times, appears and asks if he may join us. Retief falls somewhere between the novice and the veteran in terms of experience.

Watson, at 56 years of age, is not here to make up the numbers. Watching him in practice, I understand how he won so many Opens. No grain of dust is left unstudied in his analysis of Hoylake. He hits shots from every conceivable place he might visit over the next four days. He is compiling his own yardage book. He is also the last to leave each green.

THURSDAY

I had walked the course late on Wednesday to get a further impression of Hoylake. The R&A have obviously abandoned hope of sufficient rain, as every green has a keeper flooding it with a big hose. The greens are looking verdant again and the overnight rain has brought the stimp metre well below 10, from 13 earlier in the week.

Retief dislikes the slower surfaces and proceeds to leave all his bad putts short. I'm sent to the locker room to get the old faithful blade. But after an hour's practice Retief decides to revert to the new model and sends the old one back to the locker.

A half-hour delay because of thunder means it is 3.12pm when we begin our campaign for the 135th Open - a strange time, it strikes me, for the fourth-best player in the world to be given.

The veteran Watson gets to five under. He finishes poorly yet will still make the cut. I can't but feel Watson is looking at Goosen as a version of himself 20 years ago: a similar build, going about his business quietly, confidently and decisively.

FRIDAY

The reinstated putter works for Retief and the four-iron exceeds all of Tiger Woods's expectations on the 14th hole. The wunderkind is back. Not only does Woods play great golf today he also works his sorcery in typical Woods fashion: a four-iron that most would be just trying to land somewhere on the narrow green ends up in the hole - a wonderful shot that proves an omen for Tiger's eventual victory.

Of course the ball could easily have finished 25 feet beyond the hole, and we all know such shots are one step away from flukes. But it is interesting how many "flukes" great players produce, especially under pressure.

SATURDAY

Dave Musgrove is another veteran on tour. This is his 45th consecutive Open as a caddie. He was here in 1967, when he caddied for Brian Hutchinson. He has also brought in two champions, Seve in 1979 and Sandy Lyle in 1983. He is still looping at 63 years of age.

As ever in the caddie shack, one man's downfall is another's opportunity, Musgrove was actually bagless until he received a call on Saturday from John Bickerton, who had fired his caddie and heard Dave was available.

Accommodation at the Open is always a concern. There are never enough hotels. Most of us rent a house or a room in a house. A retired caddie from the Hoylake area set up three US caddies with a place to stay in West Kirby. You take a chance on what kind of place you end up in, the compromise being location at the expense of comfort.

I ask one of the three about their lodgings - and get the answer in no uncertain terms. The worst ever. It costs a fortune, the three of them are in one room, there are no beds, and Bob, the resident parrot, wakes them up at 4.30 every morning.

It's hard enough to get the Americans to travel, and this could dramatically reduce numbers at Carnoustie next year.

SUNDAY

He is the greatest golfer who ever strode the links and he proves his diligent dominance. Tiger had his strategy set from earlier in the week and has stuck rigidly to it. He used his woods simply to hang his towel on and relied on strategic irons off the tees.

Golf would appear to have become increasingly technical, heavily reliant on the latest gadgets. Ninety-five per cent of the field would have used the Graeme Heinrich yardage chart, which has every hump and hollow of the subtle links documented.

The winning caddie, Steve Williams, I notice, is using the more basic, and less detailed, Strokesaver. Maybe it is time to forgo all the confusing detail. And then maybe not - we don't all work for Tiger.