When asked what his feeling about players being paid to just turn up Keith Pelley was a tad dismissive about the subject.

The tour doesn’t get involved in appearance fees. Promoters do worldwide. IF promoters feel he need to pay for the use of big names to promote the tournament well in advance then good on them.

When asked if he wasn’t concerned, it was just a fact of life, he said no.

And he wasn’t aware of the European tour’s battle with Seve Ballesteros over appearance money which led to him withdrawing from the tour and not being selected for a Ryder Cup team.

It is this I find a little bit uncomfortable. In the fields in Dubai and Singapore the past few weeks has been American Pat Perez. Why would he be playing over here if he hadn’t been paid by promoters? To just say it’s none of our business we’ve got more important things to discuss is leaving individual tournaments that run themselves. And it is worrying, the lack of knowledge about what came before his tenure on the European Tour.

Being forward thinking, creatively marketing and finding new audiences is all well and good but it’s not learning from the past or taking heritage and legacy into consideration. Our past is always part of our present, while moving forward with golf is good anyone connected with golf at the highest level must know about who has gone before, It’s important to learn from what goes before.

While I appreciate everything Pelley is trying to modernise and popularise the sport it’s a double bogey here. He needs to take time to learn about the tour’s history. To say he’s not interested or too busy is detrimental.