I'M ON holiday in Tenerife at the moment which I booked before entering The Open.

When I got through the regional qualifying at Ormskirk, I realised I might not be coming out here.

Final qualifying finished on Monday, July 12 and I was due to fly out the following morning so the family didn't know whether or not I'd be joining them until Monday night.

If I'd qualified, I obviously would have stayed to take my place in The Open.

After a good first round at Downfield in final qualifying, I had high hopes for the second round.

But I was woken about 2.30 in the morning by loud music which went on until 4.30am when the police finally put a stop to it.

So the following day, I teed-off at 9.15am, a little tired and didn't play too well. Hence, I failed to qualify, which was very disappointing because I thought I'd been playing well enough to make it.

Being out in Tenerife I haven't seen much of The Open, but reading the papers, Ceefax and Teletext, it's annoying to hear all the whingeing that's going on.

There's so many people, including me, who would love to play in The Open - regardless of how the course is set up.

It's the same for everybody.

As for the competition itself, it's really good to see some relatively unknown names heading the leaderboard.

It gives everybody hope and I was pleased to see Paul Lawrie win because I've known him for many years through playing tournaments together.

He's a good golfer and now he's certainly proved himself at the highest level.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.