Off the tee: Geeks who give golfers hell

Professional golfers must have a love-hate relationship with television. On the one hand, it provides the best of them with obscene amounts of money.

On the other, it exposes them to public scrutiny for long periods when ordinary mortals would be spitting dummies to all corners of the course.

And then there are the train-spotters, the nit-pickers of the world who thrive in newspaper correction columns and in the teachers' team on trivia night.

Golf's screen-bound experts not only have the pleasure of showing off their knowledge, but actually affecting the results of tournaments. Train-spotters' heaven.

The latest victim of this television scrutiny was American Paul Azinger, playing last week in the Canadian Open at Hamilton, Ontario.

Azinger was penalised two shots after a viewer alerted PGA tour officials that the veteran player's caddie, Ted Scott, removed the flagstick from the 13th hole while the ball of his playing partner, Fred Funk, was still moving past the cup after a chip.

The ruling left Azinger with a two-under 68, putting him three strokes behind the leader after the second round.

He lost momentum after the incident, closing with rounds of 76 and 70 to finish 12 shots behind winner Bob Tway.

Azinger was found to be in breach of Rule 17-2b for "unauthorised attendance" of the flagstick.

The rule states: "In stroke play, if a fellow competitor or his caddie attends, removes or holds up the flagstick without the competitor's authority or prior knowledge while the competitor is making a stroke or his ball is in motion, the fellow competitor shall incur the penalty for breach of this rule."

Twelve years previously in a tournament at Doral, Azinger inadvertently moved a rock taking a stance in a hazard. A day later, a viewer called officials, and a video review showed that Azinger violated the rules.

Because Azinger did not include a two-stroke penalty in the round, he was disqualified for signing an incorrect card.

Imagine the mayhem which would follow if rugby accepted the same stringent policing of its rules. Monday's paper would print provisional results, awaiting the judgment of the armchair critics on the rightness of the referees' rulings and the unseen indiscretions of the players.

It is ironic that golfers have to be subject to this scrutiny. They are famously prompt in calling penalties on themselves, even when no-one else could have seen the infringement.

New Zealander Michael Long called a penalty on himself when in a position to win and was widely praised for his action.

Weekend golfers inadvertently transgress the more obscure rules regularly. Even pros can be caught out when trying to do the decent thing.

At the women's US Open this year, Scottish player Alison Nicholas used a tee to move a spider off her putting line and was penalised two shots.

The relevant rule says you can only use your hand or a club.

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Former New Zealand representative Richard Hislop will make his debut for Auckland in the annual clash with North Harbour at Manukau on Sunday.

Hislop was based in Wellington when he made the Eisenhower team and, after a brief professional sortie, was a member of their winning Tower tournament team at New Plymouth two years ago.

He is now based in Auckland and has been playing at the Titirangi club. He has been named at No 5 in the team for Manukau.

The clash between Auckland and North Harbour is one of few on the New Zealand representative calendar to feature teams of men and women.

Each team has 10 senior men, eight senior women, four masters men, four masters women, four junior girls, four under-19 boys and four under-23 men.

The teams will play two rounds of singles starting at 7.30am and 12.15pm.