Remember the English Open? Yeah, me neither, and now it'll be at least another year until anybody gets a chance to play it. The long-troubled event ran from 1979 to 2002, then went on hiatus until 2008. In 2009 and 2010, it was scheduled to be played at the Nicklaus-designed St. Mellion International Resort course in Cornwall, pictured there at right, but financial difficulties forced postponement to this year.
And now, alas, it's not going to go forward this year, either. Difficulty in locating sponsors, unsurprising for a tournament not held in nearly a decade, has forced event planners to postpone the tournament for yet another year.
It's a tough financial blow to St. Mellion, which has invested �20 million in the last two years to bring the course up to speed. But tourney organizers couldn't find a sponsor to pony up �2 million to cover the tournament, both because of the still-shaky economy and the commitment that many blue-chip companies have made to London's 2012 Olympics.
"It's no great surprise the tournament has been cancelled," BBC Sports golf correspondent Iain Carter said. "It's a reflection of the trend that we're seeing in European golf at the moment in that the sponsors are to be found the other side of the world, not in Europe, not in Great Britain and certainly not in England."
The event's cancellation leaves the Open Championship and the BMW PGA Championship as the only professional events being played on English soil.
English Open at St. Mellion cancelled [BBC Sport]
Kylie Bax Diora Baird Laura Prepon Ashley Scott Michelle Behennah
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