Long road back for Nick Dougherty

George Murray tries out a shinty caman in a lighthearted warmup. Picture: Stewart Grant/Studio in the Square

Both from the same generation of golfers tipped to follow in the footsteps of Sir Nick Faldo, Dougherty was considered the most likely to succeed England’s most successful player of all time and perhaps even challenge Faldo’s record of six majors.

Winner of the Singapore Open in 2005, the Dunhill Links Championship two years later, and the BMW International Open, in 2009, Dougherty appeared to have the golf world at his feet.

Dougherty was also on the cusp of qualifying for the 2008 Ryder Cup team under Faldo’s stewardship and, when he narrowly missed out on an automatic spot, it was rumoured for a time that he might even earn a wildcard.

But the 31-year-old Liverpudlian’s career subsequently unravelled to such an extent that he lost his tour card.

Dougherty admits that the death of his mother had a profound effect on him, but one suspects that there must be more to it than that when looking for reasons to explain why he currently languishes in 714th place in the world rankings.

It is a measure of how Dougherty feels about the current state of his game that he has chosen to play in the Scottish Hydro Challenge at Aviemore’s Macdonald Spey Valley Golf Course for a first prize of £30,000 rather than exercise his right as a former champion to compete in Munich this week.

But, while Dougherty’s BMW International Open win must feel as if it was a lifetime ago, he is not alone in pondering where it all went wrong.

His playing partners in the marquee group, Alastair Forsyth and Stephen Dodd have also known far happier times. Glaswegian Forsyth won the Malaysian Open in 2002 and the Madeira Islands Open six years later, while Welshman Dodd is a four-times champion and world cup-winner in partnership with Bradley Dredge, another of the big-name contenders at the Macdonald Spey Valley course.

But it has been Dougherty’s implosion that has been the most spectacular by far and, while Rose is blooming, it must be hoped that his countryman can sow the seeds of recovery and blossom once again.

George Murray of Anstruther is also keen to find a bit of form after going head-to-head with “Ronaldo” yesterday in a challenge of a different kind to the ones he is more used to.

Murray, back at the Aviemore venue for the first time for three years since he won the event in 2010, tried his hand at another sport when he challenged shinty legend Ronald Ross, known as the “Ronaldo of the Glens” after becoming the first player to score more than 1,000 goals, to a shoot-out.

Edinburgh’s Lloyd Saltman, winner of the Silver Medal as best amateur at the 2005 Open at St Andrews, also had a go at swinging a caman – the traditional shinty stick – and looked a natural as he hit three goals out of six attempts while Murray found the net once.

But when it came to Kingussie Camanachd star Ross’s turn to use a golf club he failed to hit the target each time.

Nevertheless, 27-year-old Saltman conceded: “Shinty is a lot harder than golf. It’s difficult to get the ball in the air for a start, but I really enjoyed it and it would be good for getting a bit of aggression out after playing golf.”

Meanwhile, Murray revealed that he proposed to his wife, Carrie on a previous visit to Aviemore and says that he was more nervous about popping the question than he is when he walks onto the tee at a top tournament.

“We went for a nice little stroll out to a loch and it was the most nerve-wracking walk of my life,” he said.

Murray, who credits his win at Aviemore with kickstarting his career after he went on to earn his full European Tour card, has struggled recently after suffering a freak injury. The 30-year-old Fifer slipped while travelling by train to last month’s Madeira Islands Open and damaged his ribs, which subsequently sidelined him for a fortnight.