Allow Most Likely Score, put every card in, and give clubs the power to set the rules on handicaps – that’s Tom Irwin’s plan to sort out grumbles with the World Handicap System.
On an episode of The NCG Podcast, looking ahead to what this year will hold for the controversial calculator, our podcast host advocated for old-school ‘society handicaps’, where clubs have the ultimate power to set whatever allowances they want in competitions.
He also said the only way the system would work effectively worldwide was if all rounds counted and believes Most Likely Score – which allows golfers to pick up without having to putt out in certain circumstances – was inevitable in the future.
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Considering the backdrop of noisy disapproval of the handicap system in some quarters and what it would take for those golfers to get on board, Irwin revealed: “If I was responsible for handicapping at England Golf, what I would do is introduce most likely score so people could give themselves putts.
“I would let people submit cards on their own. And I would say, ‘get on with it’, because that is the system and we want people to put in as many rounds as possible.
“We want that to be clear and across the board, so we want people to put in every round and we’re going to make it easy for people to do that by allowing them to play on their own and allowing them to give themselves putts if they’re in a group of people.
“The other thing I would do is say to golf clubs, ‘you can set your own rules. We don’t care. If you want the Playing Handicap to be 50% of the difference, or if you want your Stableford allowance to be 50% of your Course Handicap. Bat on.”
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Would golfers in GB&I ever accept Most Likely Score?
Asked whether golfers this side of the pond would accept Most Likely Score, which is synonymous with US golf and means players can still enter a score for handicap if they have started a hole but don’t finish it for a “valid reason”, Irwin added: “It won’t matter because at their club, in their own little fiefdom, they can have as much control as they want.”
He continued: “For as many years as I’ve been playing golf, we’ve had the concept of society handicaps.
“I played golf for a long time at a club in London called Croham Hurst. I occasionally played in the Swindles and their regular Saturday morning group, which was 20 or 30 people and all decent golfers, had a handicap for that Swindle.
“So never mind the system, they ran a handicap for that, which was based on their results in that competition.
“That’s what golf clubs should be given the right to do, because that gives people control, which is what they want. The only way you’re ever going to square this circle, of how you have a system that’s getting everybody on board and everyone is using properly, and you’ve got these local issues of Dave’s won again off 28, is you say, ‘we’re going to adopt the system properly’.
“That’s your England Golf handicap but what we’re going to do on a local level is say you can just have your own golf club handicap, and you can do as you like.”
Asked about the resistance he’d face if these ideas ever left the confines our podcast studio, given the traditional play the ball down competitive mentality entrenched in club golf in Great Britain & Ireland, Irwin said: “What those people want is fastidiousness of competition.
“They want to be able to turn up at their medal and trust that everybody in that competition has got a handicap which is a reflection of their current ability.
“That’s what people want and you’re not going to get that if someone in that competition has played five times that week and not submitted a single card, because how can it be reflective of their current ability? It’s not.
“You’ve got a senior golfer who plays Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, doesn’t put a card in and plays under their handicap, wins a fiver off their mates, and turns up in the medal on the Saturday and should be off a handicap that’s lower than they are and wins.
“It’s because the handicap is not a reflection of their current ability. That’s the problem. So unless you just accept that those general play rounds are going to be recorded under softer circumstances than the competition, you’re not going to end up with people off the correct index.”
Now have your say
What do make of Tom’s World Handicap System vision? Would it work or is it a fantasy? Let us know in the comments or get in touch on X.
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