Muirfield is to hold a second vote to admit female members, the golf club confirmed, after last month’s initial ballot rejected the lifting of a ban on women, leading to the historic golf course losing hosting rights for The Open Championship.
The course close to Edinburgh has retained a male-only membership policy since it was founded in 1744 and a vote last month to admit women members fell short of the required two-thirds majority.
The decision drew criticism from several top golfers, including four-times major winner Rory McIlroy, and Muirfield was removed from the list of courses that host The Open by tournament organizers the Royal and Ancient.
With 64 percent of members voting in favor of admitting women in the first ballot, club captain Henry Fairweather felt a second vote would be a step foward.
“A substantial majority of our members voted for change and many have voiced their disappointment with the ballot result and with subsequent events,” Fairweather said in a statement.
“The club committee believes that a clear and decisive vote in favor of admitting women, as members is required to enable us to begin the task of restoring the reputation of the club that has been damaged by the earlier ballot outcome,” Fairweather said.
‘GET INTO LINE’
The decision to hold a second ballot was welcomed by the Women in Sport charity.
“It is hardly surprising Muirfield’s reputation has been significantly damaged, as it is clear they currently fail to offer an environment that is welcoming to all,” Women in Sport said in a statement.
“While we hope a re-vote will see their membership policies brought into line with gender equality expectations of the 21st century, ensuring women receive the full benefits of this sport should have been happening far sooner,” it said.
“We hope the members of Muirfield, who have been afforded a second chance on this issue, will not make the same mistake twice,” it added.
ANFIELD BLUES: Kylian Mbappe arrived at Anfield on a run of 21 goals in 17 games, but he managed just three attempts in the match, none of them hitting the target Kylian Mbappe has been nearly unstoppable this season, but he hit a roadblock in their UEFA Champions League match at Anfield on Tuesday. For the second year running, the Real Madrid forward had a night to forget at Merseyside as Liverpool won 1-0. Mbappe looked a shadow of the player who has been tearing defenses apart all season. “We were lacking that threat in the final third,” said Madrid coach Xabi Alonso, without naming Mbappe individually. The FIFA World Cup winner for France rarely looked capable of finding a breakthrough against a Liverpool team who have been so defensively fragile for much of the
For almost 30 minutes, Vitomir Maricic did not take a breath. Face down in a pool, surrounded by anxious onlookers, the Croatian freediver fought spasming pain to redefine what doctors thought was possible. When he finally surfaced, he had smashed the previous Guinness World Record for the longest breath-hold underwater by nearly five minutes. However, even with the help of pure oxygen before the attempt, it had pushed him to the limit. “Everything was difficult, just overwhelming,” Maricic, 40, told reporters, reflecting on the record-breaking day on June 14. “When I dive, I completely disconnect from everything, as if I’m not even there.
An amateur soccer league organized by farmers, students and factory workers in rural China has unexpectedly drawn millions of fans and inspired big cities to form their own, raising hopes China can grow talent from the ground up and finally become a global force. The nation of 1.4 billion people has about 200 million soccer fans, more than any other country, but it has failed to build world-class teams, partly due to a top-down approach where clubs pick players from a very small pool of prescreened candidates. The professional game is marred by a history of fixed matches, corruption, and dismal performances,
Amanda Anisimova on Wednesday pulled off a stellar comeback to get the better of Iga Swiatek 6-7 (3/7), 6-4, 6-2 and book her spot in the last four of the WTA Finals in Riyadh, while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei won in the doubles at the women’s year-ending event. Making her tournament debut this week, the fourth-seeded Anisimova secured the runner-up spot in the Serena Williams Group behind Elena Rybakina. Rybakina completed round-robin play with a perfect 3-0 record, thanks to a 6-4, 6-4 success against Russian alternate Ekaterina Alexandrova earlier in the day. Anisimova improved her three-set record this season to an impressive
RSS