KEY POINTS:
There's another unholy mess surrounding the Auckland representative team which means the country's most populous golf association will have a severely under-strength team for the national inter-provincial tournament at Mt Maunganui in early December.
Eight players, including Auckland strokeplay champion Travis O'Connell, and New Zealand representative Leighton James,
have made themselves unavailable for Auckland in this weekend's annual match against Wellington at Taupo.
The others are Ryan Fox, Fraser Wilkin, Ben Wallace, Jason Mann, Mark Speedy and Ben Davies. They are playing in the Waikato strokeplay championship but would be available for the Auckland team's other commitments this season.
The Auckland Golf Association responded by instructing the selectors not to pick them at all this season. Of the eight, all except Speedy would likely have been at Taupo.
The Auckland association is unapologetic.
"We won't have a gun held to our head," Auckland Golf's Peter Seagar told me. "It's not fair on other players to pick them for Taupo, but have to say 'sorry, you're not in the side for the next match because we have eight other guys available now'.
"We only ask players to be available five times a year. Surely a top player can schedule his tournaments around those events. And isn't it worth something to play for your province?"
These eight say they are frustrated by the lack of a clear selection policy and by poor communication.
They did receive a letter about the representative programme and which tournaments would count as trials. But they say it did not insist they be available for every representative commitment.
The Waikato tournament is not a New Zealand team trial and Seagar points out that, if the national selectors asked for certain players they'd have no problem releasing them from provincial commitments as they did for Leighton James last year.
But these eight say a 72-hole strokeplay tournament is better for their golf than a Wellington-Auckland matchplay fixture. Considering the number of 72-hole events they play, and the representative matchplay programme, that highly debatable.
However, that attitude is doing the eight no favours with the people who matter most - fellow players. Words such as "arrogant" and "up themselves" are among those being bandied around. Numerous former Auckland representatives are also aghast that playing for the provincial team doesn't seem to matter much.
Auckland Golf is far from perfect and representative players have often had cause to grumble about the quality of support. For instance, players were given their playing uniforms only about half an hour before teeing off in the match against North Harbour in June.
The association is not pro-active in working with its top players to map out tournament schedules, training and practice routines.
Players have long resented the old-fashioned "blazer brigade" running provincial teams and events. Not surprisingly, Auckland hasn't won a national inter-provincial matchplay title since 1995.
There are real faults on both sides. The players should have shown more appreciation of a longstanding fixture for which Wellington is fielding a full-strength team.
But Auckland Golf's heavy-handed attitude towards young men must change and become more communicative.
