It was with some regret I learned Colin Montgomerie had not been invited to join the cast for this year's Augusta Masters. In recent years, one of the tournament's fascinations lay in watching the bulky, eternally dissatisfied Scot becoming increasingly nettled and exasperated in the cloying heat of Georgia.

It was PG Wodehouse who wrote it is never difficult to distinguish between a Scotsman with a grievance and a ray of sunshine. And how wonderfully big Colin has borne that out, showcasing what appears to be a heartfelt unhappiness with the world in general at all the premier tournaments.

Augusta always managed to reduce him to his most anguished. With its refined version of nature and mannered quietness and persistent sunshine, Augusta was never going to be temperamentally suited to the volatile and tetchy Scot. And so there was a certain malicious pleasure to be derived from watching him grow more and more agitated among the whispering azaleas and chirruping bird life. Although there is a heavy onus on all Masters participants to praise Augusta to high heaven, you always strongly suspected Monty hated the maddening pleasantness of the place.

While tan, country-club-looking types like Greg Norman looked right at home on the manicured fairways, Monty always looked hot and bothered and somehow betrayed. A Monty round always seemed to carry with it the faint chance he would tee off at the dreaded Golden Bell 12th, for instance, skew his drive and run amok, trashing the scenery and chasing after the privileged Masters bunny rabbits with a three-iron. Monty has a good pair of lungs and it is not hard imagining a truly ripping scream of his causing shock waves across the course and causing old Hootie Johnson, smoking a cheroot in the clubhouse, to press the silent button for security. And Peter Alliss all the while murmuring little consolations for the viewers back home: "Dear oh dear. Poor Monty. Oh look! They have him spread-eagled on the ninth now. My oh my!"

But of course, that won't happen next weekend because Monty, having dropped outside the top 50 in the rankings, has been overlooked. It is a pity. Still, even without the grouchy one, the Masters remains an event not to be missed. This is odd, because much about golf leaves me cold. It is more or less impossible to care about any of the tournaments outside the four Majors because the rest are so clearly and solely about the accumulation of money. And it is hard to get excited about soft-bellied men picking up fat cheques for playing tournaments on manicured courses while staying in superb locations where their every whim is catered for. The fact money is king in golf makes me inclined to dislike it.

And the effect that golf culture has on humanity in general is worrying. Golf is responsible for the white-polo-neck-

sweater-inside-a-V-neck-sweater look. Golf men of all nationalities believe in that look, as if they were taking a break from a round-the-globe yachting venture and just happened to be in your local for the night.

Golf men also have a habit of performing practice swings while talking to you. One second the golf enthusiast is behaving in a perfectly rational manner, but without warning he will begin to line up his Titleist and eye the pin in the distance and start behaving as if the soles of his shoes were on fire, stepping back and forth. Then he will let loose an imaginary drive. And the annoying thing is that you, like a plebe, actually try to follow the ball onto the fairway of the mind. It is impossible to take a conversation anywhere from that point.

Yes, Golf is a menace, but Augusta would nearly make you forgive it everything. Although Augusta has a deeply objectionable history, with its enthusiastic policy of segregation and its Good Ol' Boy ethos, its very snobbery and its suspicion of change has made it an institution worth cherishing in modern sport. The lack of advertising and marketing and the unashamedly sentimental veneration of tradition give it a dreamlike quality, a peculiarity the Wimbledon tennis tournament has also managed to maintain.

Although the sight of a stiff and feeble Arnie Palmer advancing around Augusta at snail's pace was threatening to become an embarrassment, the privilege of entering the tournament until death, granted to all Masters champions, gives big-time golf its sense of heritage. It means that while poor Monty sits at home, his compatriot Sandy Lyle gets to book into the wood cabins for the weekend. It ennobles and enshrines the feat of having won the thing and enriches the narrative, reminding players and viewers alike of the epic duels the Masters has provided over the decades.

Of course, we only have to go back to last April for the most recent classic, when Phil Mickelson, with his slightly stoned and completely freaky smile of destiny, edged out Ernie Els with a once-in-a-lifetime putt on the final green on the final evening.

So far, amicable Phil has made $2,776,456 from the seven PGA tournaments he has played this year. Figures like that are what make me think golf is little more than a white corporate lark that allows pudgy guys to buy even more yachts, Lear jets and bad clothes.

I am wrong, of course. The most interesting thing about golf is its ruthless capitalist streak whereby the rich keep getting richer and the rest get nothing. The manner in which David Duval fell like a comet from golf's untouchable constellation is one of the most stark and important tales of contemporary sport. Languishing at number 585 in the rankings, Duval has played six events this year and missed the cut in five. It was Duval, when asked by some kid chasing Tiger Woods's autograph if he was someone, who replied, "I used to be".

When you think about it, being one of the best 500 in the world at something is no mean feat. In most sports - soccer or basketball, for instance - it would guarantee a nice income. In golf, it leaves you nowhere. Mark O'Meara, pal and mentor to the Tiger, former Major man himself, is ranked 193 on the PGA board and has netted a grand $21,000 for the season. Nick Faldo, the epitome of sporting prowess for much of the 1990s, recouped £19,000 plus from the European circuit.

What golf Philistines like myself conveniently forget is that to have a bank balance like Ernie, like Vijay, like Padraig ($1,101,626 on the PGA circuit so far) you have to be a tough, tough bastard. And when you are in the game's favour, you best cash in because you just don't know when you are going to plummet to everyday, mistake-

ridden mortality.

Making a heap of cash doesn't get you remembered, however, not in the long term. Monty has made more greenbacks than most of us will ever see, but next weekend leaves him no different from any other golf enthusiast, practising an imaginary swing and convincing himself he, too, is Tiger.

That's why the Masters is such a hook. It is not about the money. And for all its folksy posturing, it is a killer of a tournament. It chews up and spits out all but the select few, the true geniuses of the game and those blessed by God on the right weekend. And it is why if Padraig Harrington is to land a Major, the Masters is the one you would wish for him.