“To get the Irish Open there one day would be fantastic, but it’s never going to go there if they don’t change the rules”.
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She praised the R&A’s swift response, though, adding: “The positive side of this is that they have acted decisively and they have very clearly made a stand that gender discrimination is no longer acceptable”. “It is 2016 and you have to move with the times”.
“The majority of members actually voted in favour of admitting women, which is encouraging, but I sincerely hope those who didn’t now reconsider and that the club as a whole revisits the issue”. It was full of ladies and I suggested what great times were coming, saying that they’ll be able to join the club.
“I enjoy all of the courses on the Open rota, but I think that’s the best”. They can decide what they want to do but they can’t have the exposure in the world the way they want it.
Dogma is the narrow-minded, insular and extremely archaic decision by those 219 members who voted on Thursday to cling to the club’s all-male membership policy. A total of 411 yes votes was required.
Muirfield remains one of just two golf courses on The Open Championship roster to reject female members, along with Royal Troon – which has written to its 800 members to raise the possibility of a similar vote after hosting this year’s Open in July.
And Thomas Bjorn, chairman of the European Tour’s tournament players’ committee, said he was “gobsmacked”.
“The damage to golf’s image is more important than us losing an Open course”, McIlroy said. “I’m gobsmacked”, Bjorn said.
An avalanche of critics then slammed the Scottish club for their decision, with Scotland’s first female minister, Nicola Sturgeon, leading the way. The R&A did the right thing.
“There is no reason why it can’t work and in this day and age, who would want to be in a golf club with only men?” Royal St. George’s, another British Open host, ended its male-only membership previous year.
R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers said in a statement: “We have consistently said that it is a matter for the Honourable Company to conduct a review of its membership policy and that we would await their decision”. “I think for us it means our process is the right process and we will see that through to the conclusion”.
R&A St. Andrews opened its membership to women back in 2014-the first time in 260 years-and R&A St. George lifted its ban on women last year, according to BBC.
The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers (HCEG) run the prestigious club and on Thursday members took a vote on whether or not they should amend their age-old regulation.
Mr Alliss, 85, continued: “I believe clubs were formed years ago by people of like spirit – doctors, lawyers, accountants, bakers, butchers, whatever they like”.
“As a proud patron and partner of the Open championship, we support the R&A’s position on this….we are committed to opening up the world of golf”, they said.
“Given the schedule for staging The Open, it would be some years before Muirfield would have been considered to host the Championship again”.
The decision from Muirfield’s members will come as a setback to organizers of the global game, who have come under increasing pressure to abandon what is seen as an archaic single-gender policy.
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“They’ve let themselves down, they really have”, Davies told Sky Sports News.
