Take a weekend
golf trip with Merv

Anyone who can remember Merv Hughes on the cricket pitch and Peter “Crackers” Keenan on the footy field can probably picture them playing golf together. It’s a safe bet there would be lots of laughs, a fair bit of sledging, the odd outburst of temper and at the end of the day, a couple of beers.

It was a social game. There was nothing riding on the result but you don’t take 200 wickets in Tests like Merv or play 200 games in the AFL like Crackers without having a healthy competitive streak. On one hole Merv’s approach to the green found the dance floor … but only just. He was 60 feet from the pin and Crackers was holding the flag. In much the same way as he honed in on a tailender’s stumps with a scorching Yorker, Merv’s putt was aggressive and straight at the cup.

Crackers pulled the pin out, the ball hit the back of the hole, jumped in the air and fell back in. Merv screamed and did the kind of war dance you see fast bowlers do in moments of triumph. Crackers snarled in disgust and told him in no uncertain terms to stop carrying on like a lunatic.

“What you mean? It was a great putt – you’d be happy if you could sink one that long,” Merv retorted.

“Mate, it was for THIRTEEN,” Crackers said.

That pretty much sums up Merv’s golf game – rare streaks of brilliance well hidden in clumps of rubbish. He boasts that on four occasions he has had a par and a fresh air swing on the same hole. And on one infamous day at Warrnambool, playing in a Footscray Cricket Club golf day, he had an albatross on the par five 18th – to enable him to break 110.

“If you play with me, don’t think you are going to be threatened by my golfing talent,” Merv says. The relevance of that remark is that if you do want to play with him – you can.

The Merv Hughes Celebrity Golf Tours give golfers the opportunity for a weekend away, playing golf with Merv and one other celebrity over a three day weekend on championship courses with accommodation and entertainment all included.

In June you and your mates can play Palm Meadows and The Glades with Merv and Damien Fleming. Then there’s the Sea Temple Golf & Country Club at Port Douglas with Merv and Rodney Hogg in July. Or back to the Gold Coast in August with Merv and Doug Hawkins.

The format is ideal for a group of mates who love their golf but don’t view it as life and death. Merv and the other celebrity move between groups, playing at least nine holes with everyone and

hosting a barbecue function on the Friday night and a sportsmen’s night on the Saturday.

Merv has been hosting cricket tours to the West Indies and elsewhere for several years and after talking about it for years, he’s finally branching into the golf market. He’s realistic enough to know that his tours aren’t for every golfer but he does guarantee those who attend will have plenty of laughs.

He reckons a suburban cricket club, or any club for that matter, might have a bit of fun organising a pre-season trip away. And he’s also offering Drummond Club members a discount. “We are just dipping the toe in the water to see if there is any interest and if there is, we will continue to run them and if not, nothing ventured nothing gained.”

Hughes played golf as a child but cricket and football were his main sports and as he progressed as a promising fast bowler the opportunities for a hit decreased. It was only when he joined the Victorian state squad and was told by coaches that golf was an ideal pre-season sport for cricket that he began to play more regularly.

The theory is that at the start of a cricket season, players can get leg weary out in the field all day. “They said the only sport that can

simulate a day in the field was golf so I started playing once or twice a week.”

This advice perhaps explains why so many of our cricket stars are good at golf. Ricky Ponting is a dedicated golfer and from Merv’s era Allan Border, Mark Taylor and Steve and Mark Waugh could all play with considerably more skill than the big bloke with the moustache.

A member at Werribee Park, Merv likes to give the ball a bit of a whack. It’s fair to say that his distance off the tee is not matched by his accuracy and while he might be a handy four-ball partner off a long mark, a stroke event is probably not going to suit him.

Mainly he plays the game for companionship and in search, as we all are, for the next perfect shot. The putt with Crackers was one of those “career highlights” and so was his albatross at Warrnambool. But he has also had two other perfect shots – which he’ll happily regale you with on the weekend away.

The first was his hole-in-one at Royal and Ancient Katherine Country Club in the Northern Territory and the second was his hole-in-one at Kingston Heath in the heart of Melbourne’s sandbelt. He’ll tell you the time, date, weather conditions, club selection, pin placement and who said what. “I don’t really like talking about my aces but if you insist…”