Ian Poulter wants it known The Open crowds are laying off the boos

Ian Poulter would like to make it clear that no one has booed him at St Andrews. Well, no, that is not quite right. If we are being scrupulous about it, Poulter would like to make it clear that only one person, “some young guy”, has booed him at St Andrews and it was just bad luck that he happened to be standing “a hundred yards down the 1st where there’s conveniently a microphone positioned halfway down the stand” so that it ended up being broadcast on TV. That was it. One boo. Singular. And anything else you have heard and read about his reception on the Old Course is just lazy journalism.

And Poulter does want the media to be scrupulous, that matters to him very much, as he explained at great length when he was asked a gentle question about whether he had enjoyed the amount of support he’d had from the crowd during his third round given what happened the other day.

“Are we still talking about that?” Poulter asked, because on the other 17 holes he played in that round “there was not one comment. There was not one boo. If you guys continue to write that there’s negative comments and there’s boos, then unfortunately that’s not a true reflection of exactly what happened.”

Poulter even gave specific directions for how to write this report you are reading now. The Observer should, he said, “actually write the truth”. He was even good enough to explain what that “truth” ought to be. “We’re getting quite a lot of support out there on the golf course” and “it would be nice, it would be a fair reflection of what’s happening” if that is what appeared here “rather than this continual press of ‘let’s head down the path of players being booed who have joined the LIV tour’. Let’s just say that, right? Fair, respectful, honest