Martin Laird: Scotland’s New Number One?

Until relatively recently, Scottish men’s golf was strong and the country’s golfers were often challenging the top of the leaderboard. From the game’s early days with James Braid, Old Tom Morris and Willie Park Snr, through their siblings – Tom Morris Jnr and Willie Park Jnr – and continuing through the years until more recently Eric Brown, Brian Barnes, Bernard Gallacher, Sam Torrance and Sandy Lyle among others there has traditionally been a strong Scottish presence in the top events.

However in recent years, the representation of Scottish golfers has been on the wane and despite the best efforts of 1991 Open Championship winner Paul Lawrie, Colin Montgomerie, Andrew Coltart and others, Scottish golfers have found themselves lagging behind their peers on the European tour and PGA tour.

The same cannot be said of the women’s game with the recent success of Catriona Matthew, who won the 2009 Women’s British Open and Janice Moodie, as well as those previously of Dale Reid.

But, the tide may be about to turn for men’s golf in Scotland with the emergence of Martin Laird onto the scene. A relative unknown until 2009 despite turning professional in 2005, Laird set the heather alight for Scottish golf once again with victory in the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open where he won in a three-man playoff to secure his PGA Tour card for 2010 and 2011, and in so doing became the first Scot to win a PGA Tour event since Sandy Lyle won the US Masters in 1988.

Laird was born in Glasgow and despite playing right-handed nowadays, actually learned to play the game as a left-hander before switching. He played on the Nationwide Tour in 2005 but took a year out in 2006. Returning in 2007, he finished in the unlucky-for-some 13th place, again on the Nationwide Tour and made the transition to the full PGA Tour in 2008. He held onto his card for 2009 by finishing in the last spot – 125th place – on the season’s money list.

Laird competed in the 2009 Open Championship at Turnberry after qualifying for the major through the American qualifier in Texas, where he finished third and also qualified for the US Open at Bethpage Black.

Laird has started strongly in 2010 and contested the SBS Championship last weekend, which was won by New Zealand’s Geoff Ogilvy. Laird played well, carding four sub-par rounds to finish in a tie for fourth place, just four shots behind Ogilvy.

If Laird can continue his improvement through 2010 he could well force his way into Colin Montgomerie’s plans for the upcoming Ryder Cup match against the United States team at The Celtic Manor resort, Wales.

And who knows, could he even become Scotland’s next major winner?