Tom Watson has a reputation for being one of golf\u2019s gentlemen, a great upholder of tradition. So when the eight-time major champion says the game has a \u201cgrowing problem\u201d with mobile phones, it is worth listening to him.<\/p>\n
Watson says his fears are twofold. Firstly, he believes phones detract from the experience of watching live sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook at Augusta,\u201d the American notes, referring to the Masters, where \u201cpatrons\u201d must surrender their mobile phones on entry. \u201cThe crowds there\u2026you see joy all over their faces. I mean, they\u2019re actually talking to each other. They are present with each other.\u201d<\/p>\n
Watson, 76, grabs my phone off the table and holds it up. \u201cI was in a restaurant in Geneva earlier this week, and I\u2019m looking down at a table, all four people are on their cell phones like this [staring down at my screen]. Not speaking with each other at all. You know, this thing right here… it takes away a lot of the joy. You know what I mean? You lose the experience of humanity. And I\u2019m guilty of it too. But Augusta, I really like the atmosphere at Augusta because of no cell phones.\u201d<\/p>\n
Watson\u2019s other fear is less obvious, but his point equally well-made. \u201cWe have an issue with betting,\u201d he says. \u201cYou can bet on each individual shot [in golf]… and I hate to actually make this public, but what really concerns me is that somebody\u2019s going to be on a cell phone like this, and he\u2019s got the betting app up, and he\u2019s got this guy out here\u2026\u2018I\u2019m going to bet that he misses this putt.\u2019 And he clicks his $100 bet, and then yells in the guy\u2019s backswing… that\u2019s what concerns me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Watson sighs. We are sitting in the Birkdale clubhouse overlooking the 18th green on the first day of this year\u2019s Open. I ask whether he would support a ban on mobile phones at all the majors and big events such as the Ryder Cup. \u201cOh, absolutely, absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n
Look back at footage of Watson winning his five Open championships, including his one here at Birkdale in 1983 when he beat Andy Bean and Hale Irwin by a stroke, and you have to say he makes a good point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tom Watson has a reputation for being one of golf\u2019s gentlemen, a great upholder of tradition. So when…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":696027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[5904,9891,217,101,5438,676,69156,56,54,55,157732],"class_list":["post-696026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-mobile-phones","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-standard","tag-the-open","tag-tom-watson","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-us-content"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=696026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/696027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}