New man at helm at Formby Hall Golf Club is driving a golf boom

Apr 15 2008 by Harold Brough, Liverpool Daily Post

THE FIRST residential PGA golf academy in the UK is opening, bringing a huge surge in interest in golf on Merseyside, a major boost to tourism and highlighting the position of Sefton’s coast as the golf capital of England.

The 62-room hotel at the Formby Hall Golf Resort and Spa, as the golf club is now known, has opened.

The PGA academy, with the latest in digital teaching systems, together with the leisure and spa facilities and a par-three course are planned to open next month, the final stages of a £10m development.

Matthew Allen-Chilman, the new head of golf at the FHGRS, assesses the effect of this linked to other golf assets across the area.

He says: “Taking what is happening here together with the superb golf courses, including the three Royals (Liverpool, Birkdale and Lytham), this region is firmly established as the number one golf centre, not just in England but in the United Kingdom. Yes, I include Scotland in that.”

As a tourist centre, part of Southport’s problem in the past has been the lack of top-class accommodation.

Allen-Chilman says: “I know that people have come to this part of the country, played on the wonderful golf courses and then, because they have been disappointed in the accommodation, they have gone home.

“That has changed now, with the opening of the hotel here and the expansion of hotels in Southport. Now, as the top golf destination, the area will realise its potential.”

He has this exciting vision of the future of golf tourism in the region. He also sees the role of the PGA academy in providing golf facilities for all, indeed the base to take golf out into the community to the schools and with possibilities of golf practice nets, erected temporarily, in the town centre, on Lord Street.

He is from Sutton Coldfield in the Midlands and has arrived at Southport from Aston Wood, where he was the golf professional.

As a teenager he was engaged in many sports, including athletics, tennis and football to county level.

“I was good at many sports, master of none,” he smiles. “I was told to concentrate on one.”

He became a part-time assistant in the golf shop at Aston Wood where he also played golf every day.

He had hardly played golf before, no more than the occasional session at the pitch and putt and the local municipal.

His first handicap was 14.

But his ability to play the game was such that within little more than a year he had reduced to four and within 18 months he had become a professional.

He played some tournaments as a pro but, as he says, his real golf passion is for teaching, which is why he is looking forward to the opportunities and the challenges provided by the golf academy and the other facilities at the FHGRS. “I see this as a fantastic opportunity with the exceptional facilities here to develop golf across the region,” he says.