The youngster approached the bar a little timidly. "Was something left here for me?" he enquired. "Indeed there was," replied Jackie Hourigan, handing the lad a 1999 US Masters cap, which still carried the original price-tag. It had been left, as promised, by an American visitor to Ballybunion GC who clearly appreciated good caddying skills.

"You were wondering what difference getting the Murphy's Irish Open will mean to us down here," Hourigan went on, while serving drinks in Harty-Costellos, the bar and restaurant he owns in the centre of the town. "Well for a start, it will stop Americans asking why it is that the course has never staged a big tournament."

By way of emphasising his relief, the 1977 Ballybunion captain explained: "I used to tell them that because of the mountains, it was impossible to get television pictures back from the south-west. Then, when Satellite TV arrived, the excuse was that the town didn't have enough hotels. And anyway, sponsors like to have events near big towns or cities."

It might appear a small thing in the context of the overall impact of playing host to the country's premier golf event. But the people of Ballybunion are proud of their course and they have been waiting for top-level tournament professionals to bestow the final imprimatur, in competition.

During my visit there last Thursday, heightened activity about the club was immediately apparent. Workmen were constructing a new entrance to the driveway, while on the far side of the road, a tractor and earthmover were preparing the practice ground.

Elsewhere, the expense of staging such a venture was less obvious. "It will cost the club about £200,000 in lost revenue, between green-fees and increased staff," said the secretary/manager Jim McKenna. "But we're delighted to get this opportunity of giving something back to a game which has been very good to the town."

The course will be closed from June 12th until after the tournament. And he went on to explain how the club had employed former tournament professional John McHenry to liaise between them and the European Tour. "In that way, we can be sure the various requirements of the tour will be carried out to their satisfaction," said McKenna.

Padraig Liston, who has the distinction of bringing the event to his native place as managing director of Murphy's, estimates the event will cost his company an additional £500,000. "We were prepared on a one-off basis to increase our investment for the Millennium staging, but it's not something we would envisage doing on an annual basis," he said.

He went on to explain how the overall attendance will be limited to 45,000 over the four days, with a maximum of 15,000 on any given day. This was the decision of an extraordinary general meeting of the club last summer, which successfully overturned an earlier committee decision to reject the staging of the event, on the grounds of possible damage to the dune structure.

Ballybunion has become famous for an opening hole with the daunting distraction of a graveyard to the right. But for the Irish Open, the present first will become the 14th, while the professionals will set forth from the sixth tee, which was originally the first, close by the old clubhouse.

That was where Jimmy Kinsella started when, in the second round of the Carrolls Number 1 Tournament in 1967, he shot a course-record 65. Against an outward par of 34 - 443 444 353 - the then 28-year-old Skerries man carded figures of 343 433 342 for a 29. It helped him ultimately to an aggregate of 283 and a top prize of £300.

As we left the putting green for the opening tee, an American visitor was heading towards the carpark. "What a course," he enthused. "Absolutely magnificent."

Quite apart from its strategic challenge, there can be few more beautiful places to play the Royal and Ancient game than Ballybunion bathed in sunshine. So it was on this occasion, with a fresh, inland breeze brushing the famous duneland, beyond which the Atlantic looked unusually calm.

"The tented village will be located to the right and left of the first fairway," said Liston, as we went down the present sixth. Pointing to the right, he indicated the area known as the Garden, which will become a corporate/tented village area, with an exhibitors' and public area on the other side.

All will be located close to the town side of the course for convenience of access.

As we progressed to the seventh tee, the so-called Long Strand stretched below us to the right, all the way down to the start of the Cashen Course. Groups of local teenagers were gathered there, carrying paper files and presumably on a school project.

The championship green on the seventh, rebuilt after coastal erosion and hugging the coastline up on the right, was not in use. But one could imagine it presenting a testing approach shot to Irish Open competitors, especially with a wind sweeping off the Atlantic.

Shortly after Kinsella's exploits of 33 years ago, Herbert Warren Wind, the doyen of American golf writers, walked the course and later described it as "nothing less than the finest seaside course I have ever seen."

Tom Watson, the current club captain, was similarly captivated. "After playing Ballybunion for the first time, a man would think that the game of golf originated there," he said. "There is a wild look to the place; the long grass covering the dunes that pitch and roll throughout the course make it very intimidating."

With the publicity generated by Watson's numerous visits to the links, green-fee traffic rocketed, prompting the club to cut back the rough. While making it more user friendly, it facilitated faster rounds. Not any more. Even Liston couldn't remember when he had last encountered such punishing rough.

Indications are that the premium on accurate driving will be even greater by the time the tournament gets under way in seven weeks' time. Yet there is no intention on the part of the European Tour to excessively protect the par of 71, just in case the wind doesn't blow.

A popular question around the town these days is: "What do you think the pros will do?" Sean Quinlivan, the former East of Ireland amateur champion who has since become a tournament professional, is familiar with the talk.

"I don't know how many times I've been asked it," he said. "I think the locals are afraid the pros will tear it apart, possibly shooting as much as 20 under. But I've assured them that they won't find it easy when the rough grows a bit more. At a little over 6,600 yards, the course is certainly not long by modern standards but it will demand accuracy."

Quinlivan and fellow professional Graham Spring are among the few regulars who play the links off the back tees. "When you have the driver in your hand off the back-markers, there's not as much room as you might imagine," he said. Meanwhile, some of the back-tees have been re-surfaced and the overall bunkering has also been upgraded.

Following a request from the club in 1995, Watson revised and updated some of the holes, notably the 18th and the fourth and fifth. And when introducing new bunkers down the right of the fifth, he could hardly have imagine he was toughening what would turn out to be the final hole of the Irish Open.

Meanwhile, in a departure from previous Irish Opens, European Tour Productions and not RTE will be the host broadcaster this year. And when competitors tee-up for the final round on July 2nd, they will be doing so on one of the busiest sports days of the year.

The last round of the event happens to coincide with the Budweiser Derby, the Munster hurling final, the final of the Euro 2000 soccer championship, the French motor racing grand prix, the Leinster football semi-final, in which Dublin are expected to be involved, and the Connacht football semi-final.

According to Niall Cogley, deputy head of television sport at RTE, the plan is to televise the golf on Network 2 at 4.30, which will be after the Derby and before the European soccer. And it will be running against the Munster Hurling Final on RTE 1.

"The expectation is that there will be 20 cameras at Ballybunion for the golf, 15 from European Tour Productions and five from RTE," said Cogley.

All of this was but a wild dream for Hourigan back in 1977, when he and the late secretary/manager, Sean Walsh, organised a national campaign to save the links from coastal erosion. Having set a target of £100,000, they actually realised the stunning figure of £176,000 and a golfing treasure was preserved.

The enthusiastic response from all parts of the country was a vindication of the assertion by Gerry Owens, president of the GUI that: "Ballybunion belongs to the nation, not merely to the members." Now, the club are set to repay their benefactors.

"Everybody knows that Ballybunion is a great course," said Hourigan, "but it has never been seriously tested by an international field. Now, seven years after our centenary, we are about to come of age."