They're going to think the Irish are a funny lot in the south of Spain this week. Especially the Dublin family who keep asking their hotel receptionist to translate the Estepona Gazette's reports on the German Masters in Cologne and the Texas Open in San Antonio.
What is the Spanish for "have you any idea if Katsuyoshi Tomori made the cut" anyway? Or "PLEASE don't tell us Bob Estes is leading the Texas Open"?
Yes, Susan Coleman, who has gone top of our overall leaderboard for the first time this year - with just ONE week to go in the competition - is currently in Spain for a relaxing week's holiday with her husband, Declan O'Neill, and children Sam and Sophie. Relaxing? Well, maybe not. Surely you won't be looking up golf scores while you're on your holidays? "We'll be doing nothing else," said Susan, when we contacted her in Estepona by mobile phone yesterday afternoon. "We'll try and get hold of some English papers and we'll be ringing home asking them to look up scores on teletext. Don't worry, we'll find a way."
Last week Susan's Winners trailed Paul 8 by £36,927, but, after the Lancome Trophy and BC Open, they are now leading Paul Sheehan's team by £16,573. Susan used her fourth and final transfer last week, replacing Vijay Singh (who didn't play) with Jim Furyk, who won her £13,250 for his share of 25th place in New York. The Winners total earnings for week 28 were £156,000, £100,000 of which was contributed by Miguel Angel Jimenez (who Susan transferred into her team just the week before), the winner of the Lancome Trophy.
Sam Torrance (joint 11th), Tomori (joint 32nd) and Mathias Gronberg, who finished outside the top 50 in France, completed the scoring for our new leaders, helping Susan overtake Paul, who had led the competition for the previous five weeks.
Jimenez's success in France rescued Paul 8's week, after both Costantino Rocca and Peter Baker missed the cut and Andrew Coltart could only finish joint 58th - Darren Clarke, Bob Estes and Billy Mayfair all took the week off.
Pauly 7, Paul's second-placed team in week 28, had an even less fruitful weekend, winning just £31,000, all but £1,000 of which came from Torrance.
Remarkably, despite having only one player in action last week, Robbie Canning moved up two places to fourth thanks to Jimenez's win, while Brian Fitzpatrick rose three places to fifth, thanks largely to Mark O'Meara's joint second finish in Versailles. So, after 29 weeks, it all comes down to the German Masters in Cologne and the Texas Open in San Antonio. "How many hours in four days," asked Paul Sheehan, when we spoke to him yesterday. "Em, 96." "NINETY-SIX? Oh my God," he groaned. "I've nearly thrown in the towel. NEARLY," he admitted, until we told him Susan had transferred Vijay Singh, who plays in the German Masters, out of her team last week. "Mmm," he said. "Maybe I will watch it after all. I had intended locking myself away to avoid hearing ANY scores."
Not such good news for Paul is that Andrew Coltart, a member of Paul 8's line-up, has withdrawn from the German Masters, due to "exhaustion", leaving him with five players in action this week - the same number representing the Winners in week 30 (see right for a guide to "Who Has Who" playing in Germany and America).
"Susan made some great transfers, I have to say - Jimenez and Torrance, in particular, have paid off very nicely," conceded Paul. "It now comes down to three versus three, so it's a toss up: Peter Baker, Costantino Rocca and Bob Estes, for me, against Susan's Tomori, Torrance and Mathias Gronberg. I think her players are better than mine, and I'd worry most about Torrance because he's in such good form, but my big hope is Estes in Texas. He won the same tournament a couple of years ago but missed the cut last year, so who knows?"
Paul's lack of optimism, ironically, reflects Susan's mood this week. "Oooh, that's bye bye to me," she said, on hearing that she was up against Rocca, Baker and Estes. Of the three, she fears Rocca most, not least because she agonised over bringing him into the Winners line-up last week . . . and now dreads that her decision to bring Furyk (who ISN'T playing this week) in instead will come back to haunt her.
The biggest irony, however, would be if the Japanese member of Susan's line-up won her our £10,000 first prize. "I got SUCH a slagging for putting in that poor Tomori man, and he's proved to be my dark horse so far," she said. Well now, wouldn't that be a good story if Tomori (that rhymes) secured Susan first prize in the 1998 Golf Masters? By the time she, Declan, Sam and Sophie board their flight home to Dublin on Sunday they should know the Winners fate. Good luck to all.
