Barclays Scottish Open to resume play on Sunday
The second round of the Barclays Scottish Open, which was suspended on Friday due to heavy downpour, is said to restart on Sunday, July 10 at 7 am Scottish Standard Time. The 140th edition of the European Tour event is taking place at the par-72 Castle Stuart Golf Links in Inverness, Scotland.
Mike Stewart, the Tournament Director, revealed the news via European Tour’s official website.
The statement on the website read, “We tried very hard. We were desperate to get out and play and we knew we had this weather window this evening when it was going to be dry and bright when we could possibly have got some play in. We are all gutted about what's happened. It's unprecedented. But we have got to try and get things repaired and, hopefully, get back on track.”
Castle Stuart was struck by rain since the start of the tournament, but conditions deteriorated on Friday afternoon. According to the Course manager Chris Haspell, several thunderbolts struck the course because of which, play had to be called off. The tour management decided to suspend the round until Saturday, but as the conditions didn’t get any better, the round was put on a further hold.
Nothing of this sort had been witnessed in the last 25 years of Haspell’s career according to the course manager. He explained that the course was completely safe, when he went for the last check on Saturday morning. The fairways were wet, but there was no sign of land sliding.
However, after his drive on the course at 3.30 am, the ground staff woke to find a huge landslip across the first fairway. A digger had to be called in to clear the mess. In addition to that, the bunkers on the tenth and the twelfth fairways were completely flooded, making the two holes unplayable.
Owing to persistence of inclement weather conditions, the tournament has been shortened to 54 holes, which means, all the 78 golfers will play one more round to wrap up the game. Graeme McDowell, Scott Jamieson and Peter Whiteford will open the final round in lead on Sunday morning.
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