Tom English: Sergio Garcia’s humility genuine

Tiger Woods and Sergio Garcia during the 1999 Masters. Picture: AP

There has been more than enough evidence of it in his career already. The shoe-throwing, the club-flinging, the microphone-smashing, the spitting, the manic defacing of bunkers and the all-round woe-is-me routine has made him a hard guy to warm to over the years. As, of course, is his nemesis, Tiger Woods.

Woods ticks all the bad behaviour boxes as well – and plenty more besides – and the latest eruption in their edgy relationship has been instructive. It began, of course, at the Players’ Championship a fortnight ago. Woods and Garcia were drawn together and were about as comfortable in each other’s company as Nigel Farage and a gang of nationalists. The world No 1 pulled a club from his bag, causing the gallery to cheer, just as Garcia was playing a shot. The Spaniard accused Woods of bad etiquette. A marshal seemed to back up Garcia, then another appeared to back up Woods. Many accused Garcia of being a moany twerp who should stop trying to blame others for his own shortcomings. Not for the first time – or the last time, you suspect – Garcia was being  criticised for infantile sulking. Certainly, that was Woods’ take on things. Back and forwards they went with the verbal jousting. All very childish, all very compelling.

On Tuesday morning, Garcia seemed to be getting some credit for saying publicly what many other players would only say in private. Namely, that he didn’t like Tiger, never has and never will. You had to admire him for having the gumption to speak up. Too many in golf would rather batter themselves with a four-iron than run the risk of upsetting Woods, so watching Garcia refusing to back down and, effectively, calling his rival a fraud and a liar was almost without precedent. Whether you agreed with him or not, at least Garcia was standing his ground. He was showing a bit of mental fortitude, a quality that he has lacked too often in his career. And then he went on stage at the European Tour’s annual awards ceremony on Tuesday evening.

Garcia made a comment about Woods that could have been – and was – construed as a racist remark. Let’s be clear here. Garcia is capable of terrible ignorance and arrogance, but there’s nothing that points to him being a racist. Yes, he made a racially loaded remark and the fact that he wasn’t chucked out of this week’s action at Wentworth or – get this – not even fined by the Tour tells you much about the hear no evil, see no evil culture in the upper echelons of the game

After making the comment, Garcia apologised profusely, almost cringe-makingly, in fact. He said everything he had to say and then said it again and again. In these situations you always tend to be suspicious. When an athlete is forced into an apology, is it genuine regret he, or she, is  expressing – or merely regret at having been caught out? With Garcia, that uncertainty didn’t really exist. Not to these eyes anyway. His contrition seemed absolutely genuine. He was mortified and he was sorry. George O’Grady and Tim Finchem, respective heads of the Tours in Europe and America, said precious little. Their leadership was nonexistent.

Saying on stage that he would feed Woods “fried chicken” if he came around to the Spaniard’s house doesn’t sound at all incendiary on the face of it, but when you know the racially stereotypical connotations of those words then they can be deemed hurtful and nasty. There was no need to condemn the Spaniard out of hand but there was every need for Garcia to express his sorrow, which he did. By the time he had  finished his mea culpa you  almost started to feel some pity for him. Woods is not only trouncing him on the golf course but he’s also trouncing him off it. Woods has the career that Garcia always wanted. At one time, many years ago now, these two looked like they were going to form the rivalry of  the age but Garcia has been a profound disappointment on that score.

The only thing the Spaniard has achieved in the last 24 hours was to make a sympathetic character out of Woods – a hell of a feat beyond the ken of so many who are paid to do it, but now achieved, ironically, by the man who dislikes him more than most.

When Garcia uttered the words “fried chicken” there was said to be disbelief in the room. Sixteen years may have passed since Fuzzy Zoeller reaped the whirlwind when crassly, but not maliciously, insulting the victorious Woods at the Masters. Nobody in the game with any memory of that incident  in 1997 thought they’d ever hear anything like that again. Zoeller had spoken about the new champion, Woods, and had told journalists to pass on some advice to him when he came in for his press conference. “You know what you guys do when he gets in here? You pat him on the back and say congratulations and enjoy it and tell him not to serve fried chicken next year [at the champions’ dinner]. Got it? Or  collard greens or whatever the hell they serve.”

The public backlash against Zoeller was enormous – and rightly so. For his boorish insensitivity he was slaughtered – but not banned. No, no of course not.

In his initial response to a gathering storm, Garcia apologised for a “silly remark”, but was challenged on that when Woods took to Twitter to say that it wasn’t silly but hurtful. Yesterday afternoon brought Garcia’s press conference and contrition on a grand scale.

He apologised unreservedly. He said he was caught off guard by the question. He was at pains to point out that he couldn’t say sorry enough. He felt sick and stupid – “truly, truly sorry”. It was an apology the like of which we have not seen in a long time. He was diminished, though, and he shouldn’t be playing at Wentworth this week.