How to gatecrash a round at the Open

There were two ways to secure a round of golf on the Old Course yesterday. The hard way was to get onto the list of 159 official competitors, and the easy way was to kit yourself out in Tom Morris's golf shop, wander on to the first tee, sink a tee peg into the ground, and propel a ball in the vague direction of the Swilken Burn.

Assuming you did not draw undue attention to yourself by turning up with jeans tucked inside a pair of socks, and then skewering one off the hosel into the caddies' hut, you were home and dry. The next 18 holes could have been spent walking the world's most celebrated links (possibly with the likes of Nick Faldo and Jack Nicklaus) making idle chit-chat about yardages and your recent fifth place in the Stoke Poges monthly medal.

This mildly startling realisation came about in an attempt to locate a qualifier by the name of Nigel Graves. His advertised starting time was 12.10pm, and when three relatively anonymous figures duly struck off shortly after noon, I wandered into the fairway and asked the nearest caddy whether he might be Mr Graves' employee. "No, sorry." "Er, what about him then?" "Haven't a clue." "And him?" "No idea."

At this point, it seemed a sound idea to make further inquiries at the starter's hut, but the starter had no more idea of the identity of the three men who had just walked off the most revered first tee in golf than the village postmistress in Auchtermuchty.

Now you know how the Championship's most celebrated gatecrasher Maurice Flitcroft got away with it, or at least until the playing partner responsible for marking his score ran out of pencil lead. When Sandy Lyle completed his practice round, he was asked: "Who were you playing with?" Sandy gave this careful thought, and replied: "Er, I can't remember."

So there we have it. It normally costs pounds 55 and a lengthy advance booking to play the Old Course at this time of year, but as the Championship is due back at St Andrews in 2000, all you have to do is find out when practice day is, pack the clubs in the boot, and if anyone challenges you, just mutter: "Duffy Waldorf", or something equally anonymous.

Meantime, the search for Nigel Graves went on. There was an entry for him in the "Players' Guide" which ran to all of two dozen words, and apart from revealing him to be a 5ft 9in club professional at Hamptworth in Wiltshire, who had won the "1995 Howson Hippo Tour", that was about it.

No one on the entire golf course appeared to have heard of him, apart from a practice ground official who said: "He's not very tall, and he's got fair hair. But I haven't seen him all day." However, in mid-afternoon, someone fitting that description stepped on to the first tee, confirmed that he was indeed Nigel Graves, and, yes, he would be very happy to have a chat as he went about his practice.

The story of how Graves booked his place here takes some beating. He emerged from regional qualifying at North Hants, tied for the one remaining place with 15 other golfers, who were promptly required to play off in sudden death. Graves and five others birdied the first, and by the time they had completed three extra holes, it had boiled down to two.

By then it was so dark that the organisers invited both men to return the following morning, but Graves said: "We both had a fair way to travel, and decided to play on." This they did, on a par three of 190 yards, although there was one minor problem. It was so dark, they could not see the flag.

This problem was solved by illuminating the green with a car's headlights, although the battery was in danger of getting flattened when they teed off for the third time. Both men hit the putting surface, but Graves took three more to get down, and was eliminated. "It was somewhere around twenty to 11 at night," he said.

However, he finally sneaked in through late withdrawals, and today plays his first round at the Open Championship itself. If it is the usual question of wind or calm, he has no chance either way. On the other hand, if there is a total eclipse of the sun, there is no more experienced man in the field.