The Asian Tour has come to my neck of the woods this week. Well, sort of. It’s a four-hour drive from my home just outside Kuala Lumpur to Johor Bahru for the Iskandar Johor Open.
I thought I’d make the journey so I could cover the tournament for Reuters, for whom I am on a retainer, covering Asian sport in general and whatever of interest happens in Malaysia.
I was quite disappointed, but not surprised, when Reuters told me they were not really interested in daily reports. However, if I could find an interesting side story or personality, then I was more than welcome to write something for them.
I cannot really blame Reuters. They have to think of the needs of their clients. But the situation highlights the problems the Asian Tour face in generating publicity for their events.
They have no problems with tournaments such as the Singapore Open, which has attracted the likes of Adam Scott and Phil Mickelson, or those events that are co-sanctioned by the European Tour, which guarantees at least a handful of players with marquee names.
This is not the case for events such as the Johor Open, whose total prize money of $300,000 is a mere one-third of just the winning purse for your average US PGA Tour event.
The Asian Tour knows what is has to do. Simply keep plugging away and provide tournaments for its members and hope they can increase playing standards to an extent that they can perk the interest of regional and, eventually, international media.
In the meantime, I’m going to look for my interesting personality piece for Reuters. There is a 13-year-old Malaysian who is the third youngest to play in an Asian Tour pro event, and there is also a 16-year-old Thai player who may have something deep and meaningful to say.
I was hoping Kyi Hla Han, the chief executive of the Asian Tour, would be here so I can ask him about the latest developments concerning their dispute with the European
Tour.
However, he left on Tuesday and I only got here on Thursday night. My hope is that, one day, the golf itself will be strong enough to be the main story rather than the peripheral events. When that happens, Reuters would be banging on my door for articles.
