R&A Follow Up: What Changed Since July?

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Thanks to @CoachesHotSeat for alerting me to the Unofficial Partner blog, which has stellar posts about the business and political side of the game (these two here and here give you a nice flavor of the content).

A post from last July dealt with Peter Dawson's rebuke of the media at the 2013 Open Championship when the female membership issue was raised in the R&A press conference. While most of the questioning centered around Muirfield's policy, the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews--forefathers of the R&A--was very much on most minds.

Unofficial Partner broke down Dawson's comments at Muirfield last July, which included this:

Single-sex clubs are in a very small minority in the UK. Half of them are women only, half of them are men only. They're perfectly legal. In our view they don't do anyone any harm. And we think the right of freedom of association is important. And we've explained our view that we think they have no material adverse affect on participation. On the other hand, the media are, with seemingly boundless energy, I think, and enthusiasm, giving out the message that this is an issue, and that such clubs should be condemned to extinction, and we shouldn't be using one to stage The Open Championship. And we understand that view, too. We've got, as you mentioned, politicians posturing, we've got interest groups attacking the R & A, attacking The Open, and attacking Muirfield. As you can see, I've made a few notes about it (laughter). To be honest, our natural reaction is to resist these pressures, because we actually don't think they have very much substance.

Now, in Dawson's defense he did say there would be a review after The Open and we now know that review has taken place. That was in between the various snippy comments about the press and the politicians and everyone else ganging up on them.

Apparently, we were to infer from those comments last summer that this decision was "expected."

From John Huggan's report this week:

"This is something that has perhaps been expected," said R&A chief executive Peter Dawson at a meeting with the media in his office overlooking the first tee on the Old Course. "I'm not going to say overdue, but it has been expected. So I am delighted to announce that the General Committee, supported by every other club committee, is recommending to the members that we welcome women into the club in future."

It's a (fast) changing world.