Golf: Golf chief seeks help to end rift

Golf Association chief executive Peter Dale has called in outside help in an attempt to patch up his relationship with coach Mal Tongue.

Tongue, 46, the national director of coaching, and his five assistants resigned from their NZGA contracts on Wednesday.

He said his professional relationship with Dale had deteriorated to the stage where he did not feel as if he had Dale's confidence.

Dale said NZGA head office staff in Wellington, including himself, were left stunned when Tongue delivered the six letters of resignation.

He said he had received but not accepted them, and hoped to resolve the matter in days.

He had approached an intermediary, a person from outside golf, to mediate with the coaches on his behalf, but did not believe it would help the process to identify the intermediary.

Unrelated to that, Don Tricker, a senior adviser of Sport and Recreation, the Government's sports funding agency, has visited Tongue.

Tricker said he was speaking to Tongue only to get his version of events and to see whether there was any way he could help to resolve the issue.

NZGA board chairman John Patterson said there had been no thought of convening an emergency meeting of the board, but that could happen if necessary.

Joining Tongue in tendering their resignations were his five assistants - Bob McDonald (Auckland), Simon Thomas (Dunedin), Murray Macklin (Wellington), Brian Boys (Hamilton) and Shane Scott (Christchurch).

They have been working with Tongue since 2002, implementing a streamlined coaching programme to develop amateur players to the stage where a professional career is an option.

The mass resignations take effect in two months.

- NZPA