Peter Williams: Turner's role vital to the future of New Zealand Open

New Zealand Open organisers are out to ensure all players, especially those from the European Tour, have a highly satisfying experience here next month. That means providing not only a fair golfing test but also offering an off course environment that is efficient and hassle free.

Greg Turner's place in this is pivotal. After 18 seasons on the European Tour, his knowledge of player nuances is beyond question. These days a good gym, a crèche and properly functioning player's lounges are almost as important as a classy practice area and a well presented course.

New Zealand Golf, in its first foray into a co-sanctioned event, has a major asset in Turner and is using him wisely. He was at Gulf Harbour this week along with Australasian PGA Tour tournament director Andrew Langford-Jones to look at the course a month out from the tournament.

For someone who was highly critical of the place during his only competitive outing there at the World Cup six years ago, Turner's feelings about Gulf Harbour appear to have been tempered by changes made since.

The earthmovers have been brought in on the 16th and 17th fairways to make the landing areas flatter and prevent the run-off that often well hit tee shots deviate into the rough, or in the worst case on the 16th, into a hazard.

The very way the course is built, with its couch grass fairways and ryegrass rough, means this New Zealand Open will have probably the widest fairways in the history of the tournament.

There will be no growing of rough to make restrictive landing areas only 25 metres wide and enforce accuracy off the tee. On some holes the target zone will be twice that width. That means the contenders at this New Zealand Open are likely to be the best exponents of iron play, and, as is the case at all golf tournaments, the best putters.

Gulf Harbour, according to the card, measures 6419 metres or barely 7000 yards. It could finish up even shorter as some tees may be brought forward, especially on the two shorter "risk and reward" par fours, the 7th and the 12th, in order to encourage attacking play.

Turner is well aware that if the weather is as benign between February 10-13 as it was from January 10-13 then the expansive fairways and the relative shortness of the course will put it at the mercy of the field and could lead to some very low scores.

It happens at the best of golf courses. Turner himself missed the cut at the 1990 British Open at St Andrews after shooting even par for the first two rounds. Nick Faldo won that year with 18 under on four peaceful Scottish days.

The scoring at Gulf Harbour, as it was at the 1998 World Cup, will be determined by the weather and as that is an unknown, the course is being prepared to ensure that even in the most extreme of winds, the place will be fair.

This New Zealand Open is a crucial one for the tournament's future. It doesn't have the budget of most others on the European Tour. But if it wants to keep attracting quality players from that Tour, and maintain a long term co-sanctioned status, then it has to ensure that this, the Tour event furthest from Europe itself, provides a quality experience which will be worth coming back for.

Turner's place in New Zealand Open history is assured because of his two wins. But his current and future contributions to the tournament could turn out to be far more significant.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY