‘Women allowed in the clubhouse now, but it shouldn’t have taken until 2020’ - Mel Reid on golf’s slow pace of change

English player glad to be accepted at Royal Troon

Mel Reid was not allowed in the clubhouse at Royal Troon during her amateur days. Picture: Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

A welcome wind of change has blown through Royal Troon. Just ask Mel Reid, who wasn’t even allowed in the clubhouse when she won twice as an amateur at the Ayrshire venue but is now among those making history in the AIG Women’s Open.

After carding a third-round 68 to surge up the leaderboard in the first staging of the event at a club that had no women members until around four years ago, the English player recalled her back-to-back wins in the Helen Holm Trophy in 2006 and 2007. The final round of that tournament is played over Royal Troon and Reid, inset, one of the most vocal players in the game over inequality in golf, has enjoyed seeing how the club has dusted off its dinosaur image along with a number of others in Scotland in recent years on her return this week.

“Women weren’t allowed in the clubhouse when I played here,” she recalled “It’s a huge step forward that we are playing here this week and we’ve got Muirfield [announced as the 2022 venue earlier this week] on the rota as well now, which is another huge step forward. It’s what we deserve. It shouldn’t have taken until 2020 for people to realise that, but we want to play these great golf courses like the men and really test our skills and show the world how good we are.”

Reid, a six-time LET winner, has been encouraged to hear Justin Rose, Tommy Fleetwood and Tony Finau all show support for the women’s game recently but added: “We need more voices like that because it is important that people know the standard of women’s professional golf is really good. We need them to talk about us and it’s great to see that happening.”

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