Genesis Scottish Open has earned its place as golf's fifth strongest field

The East Lothian venue first staged the tournament in 2019 and let’s not beat about the bush because it wasn’t exactly the best of starts after the event had visited Castle Stuart, Royal Aberdeen, Gullane and Dundonald Links after the end of its lengthy and popular run at Loch Lomond.

In fairness, Mother Nature didn’t help because the Tom Doak-designed course was basically defenceless that week due to the fact there was little or no wind and, on top of that, it had been softened up by some heavy rain at the start of the week.

As a result, the winning total was 22 under par - Austrian Bernd Wiesberger claimed the title in a play-off - and a number of players, including a certain Rory McIlroy, made their feelings known about what they thought of the course at that time and the test - or lack of one - that it provided.

It was another two years before McIlroy returned and he still wasn’t a fan of the American-owned course after missing the cut on that occasion, but, in two subsequent appearances, it looks as though it has started to grow on him.

It helped when the Northern Irishman landed the coveted title for the first time with a spectacular birdie-birdie finish to pip Bob MacIntyre in 2023 before he then tied for fourth behind the Scot last year.

Rory McIlroy will be back

McIlroy has now confirmed he’ll be back again in July as the Masters champion and just the sixth player to complete a career grand slam, which is testimony to the event in particular but also the venue.

The odd eyebrow may have been raised at the time when it was announced that, starting in 2022, the Genesis Scottish Open would be co-sanctioned by the DP World Tour and PGA Tour but not any more, surely.

At a media day for this year’s event, tournament director Rory Colville revealed that last year’s edition had officially had the fifth strongest field of the year in the game and, yes, that included the four majors.

Make no mistake, that truly is something to boast about, even though the Official World Golf Ranking may be a bit misleading these days due to the fact that LIV Golf events don’t offer any counting points.

There can be no denying that, under the Bell’s and Barclays banners then during a spell when Aberdeen Standards Investments was the title sponsor, the tournament was always one of the best on the DP World Tour, helped, of course, by its coveted pre-Open slot.

Its status, though, has definitely been elevated through that co-sanctioning set up and also, of course, Korean car giant Genesis coming on board as the title sponsor in 2022.

“We see this as a truly global significant event,” said Colville, a proud Scot on a sun-kissed day on Scotland’s Golf Coast. “We’ve had three outstanding years of Xander Schauffle, Rory McIlroy and our very own defending champion Bob MacIntyre winning in dramatic circumstances.

“So we are very proud of where the tournament has gotten to and we are very much looking forward to this year, when the player field will be strong once again.”

Strong field once again

In addition to McIlroy and MacIntyre, major champions Justin Rose, Collin Morikawa, Justin Thomas and Matthew Fitzpatrick have all confirmed they’ll be there while Schauffele, winner of both the PGA Championship and The Open last year, hinted in a recent interview that he’ll be back as well.

Given that he only skipped it last year due to the Olympics being part of the 2024 summer schedule, there’s also a strong possibility that world No 1 Scottie Scheffler could be returning to Scotland’s Golf Coast, too, after teeing up in the three previous editions.

It’s no secret, of course, that some people will never be huge fans of The Renaissance Club, believing traditional links courses like Gullane and Royal Aberdeen should be hosting our national Open as opposed to one of the so-called new kids on the block.

However, the Sarvadi family - John is now the CEO, though his brother Jerry is still around and, as he took great delight in reminding me once again, has no plans whatsoever to disappear - have ploughed lots of money into improving the course since that first edition and certainly deserve credit for that.

Having played it during the aforementioned media day, it is more linksy now than it has ever been and, for this time of the year, the greens were both very firm and very fast, which hopefully augurs well for July 10-13.

Supporters enjoying the ride

With the fan experience being improved all the time - a ‘stadium’ introduced last year at the short sixth will create even more of an atmosphere on this occasion while KT Tunstall, the Grammy-nominated, Brit Award-winning artist will be the headline act on a Fringe by the Tee pop-up stage in conjunction with the popular Fringe by the Sea festival - the Genesis Scottish Open has been grown into an event we should all be proud of.

And, with it set to mark McIlroy’s first appearance outside of either the US or Canada as Masters champion and a career grand slam winner along with Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods and, of course, MacIntyre teeing up as the defending champion, it promises to be an even more special week on the summer schedule.

Oh, and let’s not forget the fact that the Genesis Scottish Open has now raised more than £1 million for charities in association with The Renaissance Club Charitable Foundation. See, I told you it is something to shout about.