McEwan: Yes, Martin Slumbers has made golf better. That’s the problem.

In all probability, you would have been given short odds on one of golf’s most influential power-brokers vacating their seat by the time 2024 gives way to 2025. They just would have lengthened considerably had you specified it would be Martin Slumbers.

The chief executive of the R&A, Slumbers has announced that he intends to stand down before the end of this year. When he leaves office, it will draw a line under a nine-year tenure as one of the game’s chief administrators, or ‘custodians’ as he has previously self-referenced.

The 63-year-old will oversee The Open at Royal Troon, the return of the AIG Women’s Open to St Andrews and the 43rd Curtis Cup match at Sunningdale before handing over the reins to an as-yet unnamed successor.

The news comes as something of a surprise, not least because of the timing. It is hardly an original observation to point out that the male professional realm of the game remains in abject turmoil. All the money in the world, it would appear, cannot buy cool heads and common sense.

Privately, that has been a source of frustration for Slumbers, a precise and pragmatic operator. When I met with him at the R&A’s Golf It facility shortly before Christmas – more of which shortly – he expressed his hope that the fractures in the professional game could be remedied, adding: “As a golf fan and from and R&A perspective, I’d like the dialogue to be about the quality of play rather than the money.” And that’s the former global head of investment banking at Deutsche Bank saying that.

However, it’s hard to imagine frustration over matters outside of his control – which he readily acknowledged ‘framework agreement’ discussions were – prompted his resignation. Slumbers is not a man predisposed to kneejerk reactions or fits of pique. More likely is the fact that he has appraised all that he has achieved during his tenure and concluded that it represents an impressive body of work.

And it does. Despite challenges including but not limited to the aforementioned pscyhodrama in the men’s game to the COVID-19 pandemic, Slumbers has overseen a raft of significant changes, dragging an often change-averse sport into the 21st century.

Often forgotten is the integration of the Ladies Golf Union into the R&A, a momentous move that consolidated grassroots control of the men’s, women’s, boys’ and girls’ games, whilst simultaneously evaporating one of the sport’s more superfluous gender divides. Speaking of which, he also removed the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers from the Open rota in May 2016 after the club voted to reject a motion that would have allowed women to join. It was a bold and decisive action that prompted the club to hold another vote on the same subject the following year. Lo and behold, it passed and Muirfield’s Open privileges were restored.

He also oversaw the modernisation of the Rules of Golf in 2019, the roll-out of the World Handicap System in 2020, and helped deliver the Distance Insights Project, which, just last month, advocated for a rollback in golf ball technology (with future changes to clubhead design also proposed).

Slumbers’ commitment to making the game more inclusive and diverse can be witnessed by the launch of the G4D Open – disability golf’s first major – as well as a new African Amateur Championship, the Women’s Amateur Asia Pacific championship and the Women’s Amateur Latin America championship. Securing a title sponsor for the AIG Women’s Open and tripling its prize money in just eight years is another significant feather in his cap.

All of which is to say nothing of the aforementioned Golf It. An extraordinary complex, this family-centred, community-focused facility, based in the heart of Glasgow, has created an opportunity for more people to experience golf and for members of the local community to gain work, volunteering and training opportunities. Its eminently scalable blueprint is the realisation of one of Slumbers’ visions and, for good measure, saved the council-run Lethamhill golf course from otherwise inevitable closure.

Those are the changes you can see but there are, arguably, just as many that you might not. The R&A is a fundamentally different organisation to the one Slumbers inherited from Peter Dawson in 2015. It has always commanded authority but previously did so in a more austere, officious way. As an example of how that has changed, consider the casual appearance of R&A staff at events such as the Open. Gone are the shirts, ties, blazers and thousand-yard stares; in their place are trendy, modern outfits and, importantly, smiles. It is an organisation you now want to work with, that communicates well, which behaves with clarity and good humour, which might not get every decision right but will engage you in dialogue about the decision-making process. It’s more transparent, more future-facing and more dynamic than it has ever been.

A large proportion of the credit for that must go to Slumbers, which is also why it’s such a shame – indeed, concern – that he is stepping down. Now more than ever, golf needs stable and sensible leadership, the presence of an adult in the room, so to speak. Martin Slumbers has performed that role with aplomb. His successor might well do likewise. Ideally, they’ll do it even better. But it’s not a given that they will, which is where doubt, uncertainty and, sure, a little bit of fear creeps in.

Bottom line: whoever comes next is under huge pressure. There are, as they say, huge shoes to be filled. Such is the nature of these things, new, unforeseeable and considerable challenges will inevitably follow. Will he or she have the stomach for the fight, the wherewithal to make the right decisions, the appetite and capacity to innovate and to push the game forward?

Let’s hope so.

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Michael McEwan is the 2023 PPA Scotland ‘Columnist of the Year’ and ‘Writer of the Year’

Michael McEwan is the Deputy Editor of bunkered and has been part of the team since 2004. In that time, he has interviewed almost every major figure within the sport, from Jack Nicklaus, to Rory McIlroy, to Donald Trump. The host of the multi award-winning bunkered Podcast and a member of Balfron Golfing Society, Michael is the author of three books and is the 2023 PPA Scotland 'Writer of the Year' and 'Columnist of the Year'. Dislikes white belts, yellow balls and iron headcovers. Likes being drawn out of the media ballot to play Augusta National.

Deputy Editor