NOT ALLURING.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 388, 20 March 1937, Page 7

NOT ALLURING.

What Golf Pros. Earn in Britain.. The £2OOO a year mention; d as the all-in value of the golf professional’s job at Sunningdale, says an exchange, would not make Hagen, Sarazen or a number of other Am rican stars turn green with envy, bift to most of the professionals in Britain it seems fabulous wealth. It is estimated that 70 per e nt. of the professionals in Great Britain, after paying their expanses, have £l5O or less a year to live on. The average successful player who makes a fair show in tournaments plays in :i few Exhibitions, and has some reputation as a teacher, barns £3OO to £4OO a year. It is only when golfers attain Ryder Cup statue' that their incomes rise above the three-figure mark. Most professionals are pa’d on the retainer basis. The rarm.irder of their income is drawn from sales at «.h:ir shops and lessons. Retainers vary from £1 to £5 a week. Only the top rank players get more than £5. The smaller clubs want their professionals to stay at home, give lesions, play with all sorts and conditions of members, supervise the upkeep of the course and sell and repair clubs. The more prosperous chibs like men who will bring them into the news in big tournaments and cater almost exclusively for scratch players. But in both cases the profi t Cessionals, not the clubs, are expected to pay the assistants they employ. Ninety per cent of British professionals fail to show a profit on tournament play, and if they are ambitious they must pla?z in tournaments. It is only on great occasions like the open championship that subscriptions to cover their expenses are raised. There are many players wlm • nen • between £2OO and £3OO a yew on Tournament expenses, occasionally taking <a prize, but always out of iw*ket. Probably there are no more -than six players in Britain malrng as much as £2OOO a year regularly.