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R&A to broadcast ‘Open for the Ages’

With this month’s Open Championship at Royal St George’s postponed until 2021, the R&A is hoping to engage golf fans in a bit of nostalgia for golf’s oldest major by broadcasting a compilation of footage from past championships and inviting golf fans to pick a winner.

‘The Open for The Ages’ will bring together many of golf’s greatest champions to compete against each other over the Old Course at St Andrews in an innovative three-hour broadcast production.
The edited mash-up features 50 years of archive footage woven together with modern graphics and new commentary to imagine an Open Championship contested by the legends of the sport including Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Seve Ballesteros, Tom Watson, Sir Nick Faldo and Rory McIlroy.

‘The Open for The Ages’ will culminate in a final round programme that will air on Sunday 19 July, when it will be broadcast globally to fans around the world on TV, TheOpen.com and The Open’s social media channels. Coverage of the first three rounds, which will take place from July 16-18, will be provided by in-play clips, live leaderboards and end-of-play highlights.

The winner will be determined by a fan vote and a data model that takes a player’s career statistics into consideration.

The ‘coverage’ in the UK will be broadcast on Sky Sports and will also be free to view via TheOpen.com and The Open’s YouTube and Facebook channels. Ewen Murray, Nick Dougherty, Butch Harmon and Iona Stephen will provide the commentary.

Martin Slumbers, chief executive of the R&A, said: “Golf is one of the very few sports where this concept can be created and brought to life. The way in which the sport is filmed allows us a truly unique opportunity to reimagine history and bring together the greatest players from many different eras on a scale which has not been done before, either in golf or in other sports. We are all keenly feeling the absence of The Open from the global sporting calendar this year and so we hope that this broadcast will generate real interest and enjoyment for the millions of golf and sports fans who closely follow the Championship every year.”