Fairytale ending wasn’t to be for Watson’s love affair with Scotland

Carnoustie is an unlovely seaside town in Angus, not far from Dundee, famous only for its legendary golf links. If you like holidays windy and chilly and want to play one of the most difficult public courses in the world, it’s perfect. Otherwise, try The Algarve.

Summer green fee for the Championship course - it has three - will set you back £200, half that if you go between November 1 and March 31. I played it once (19 points). Once was enough.

I first saw The Beast when it hosted the 1975 Open. It was my first sighting of the finest exponent in my lifetime of links golf. Tom Watson was his name, a sort of Justin Spieth of the 1970s, chatty, brilliantly bold putter, never afraid of the four-footer back.