On the fairways of life you can never be certain of when you play your last shot, and sadly the time came for two of SA golf’s most passionate supporters last week.
When the First Lady of SA golf Vivienne Player lost a long battle with pancreatic cancer, she was — expectedly — in her husband’s arms.
Gary and Vivienne were together for 72 years and married for 64. They raised six children and have 22 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
“I was playing cricket and peered over a fence and there she was, hitting golf balls. The moment I laid eyes on her, it was love at first sight,” the Grand Slam winner often recalled.
Gary asked Vivienne to marry him when he was just 14 and promised they would tie the knot as soon as he could support a family. That day came in 1956 when he won in Australia. With the $5,000 wining cheque in his pocket, he simply sent her a telegram that read: “Buy the dress.”
The daughter of golf professional Jock Verwey sported a beautiful swing and the talent to pursue a successful career of her own, but her love for Gary won out and she put family first.
The winner of more than 160 professional tournaments, nine Major and nine Senior Major titles always said she was the only person he asked for swing advice since she could break down a swing better than any professional coach.
Ironically, Vivienne accomplished something the Black Knight never could.
In 1978 at the Wanderers, Vivienne famously made two aces in one round when she holed out on the third and the 15th. It was nearly a hat-trick, but she was denied by a flagstick that prevented the ball from dropping in the hole.
Their indescribable love carried them through six decades and one prays it will continue to sustain Gary.
Tall and broad-shouldered, with a booming voice and a croaky laugh, SA Golf Association president Martin Saaiman had an equally large presence within the golfing community.
Martin served in golf administration for almost 30 years. On finally having reached the top administrative position within the men’s amateur game, his reign was sadly cut short, robbing him of the chance to fully implement his many bright ideas and strategies for growing the game and improving the structures that run amateur golf.
But his footprint remains hard to miss.
The president for eight years, Martin played a major role in the rise of Ekurhuleni Golf Union and his passion for development was legendary.
During the annual junior awards in December 2013, he walked me around the room and pointed out some youngsters ... among them, Kyle McClatchie, Jayden Schaper, Casey Jarvis, Caitlyn Macnab and Yurav Premlall. “Watch these kids,” he said. “Mark my words, they are going to be impressive.”
McClatchie became only the second SA golfer to win the famous Brabazon Trophy; Schaper the first junior to achieve the Grand Slam of Nomads SA Boys, winning at U-13, U-15, U-17 and the double at U-19 level.
Jarvis won the SA Amateur Stroke Play and Match Play titles and the Freddie Tait Cup as the leading amateur in the SA Open in a calendar year in December 2020, only the second amateur in history to achieve this feat.
SA Women’s Amateur double winner Macnab became the first amateur to win on the Sunshine Ladies Tour since 2007 with her eight-stroke triumph in the Jabra Ladies Classic in March and Premlall underlined his rising status with a wire-to-wire victory in the inaugural Nedbank Junior Challenge at Sun City.
In 2015, he entered a team of young juniors in the A-Section of the SA Inter-Provincial Tournament. He was stoic in his belief that this group would benefit from being thrown in the deep end and would go on to achieve great things. The side narrowly avoided relegation at Bryanston Country Club, but Martin’s plan was in motion, and he was proved correct within four years.
His young guns won three successive Junior SA IPTs and in 2019, he watched on like a proud father as his Roses — featuring five of the Bryanston juniors — were crowned SA IPT champions for the very first time in the union’s history at Mbombela Golf Club.
Martin was never one to beat about the bush or pay lip service.
His direct approach left one in no doubt as to what he was thinking, and he had an uncanny knack of cutting through the peripheral nonsense to get to the point.
His legacy will live on through the excellent golfers he helped to develop, and the administrative structures he left behind.
Both Vivienne and Martin will be sorely missed throughout the golfing industry, but both have left their mark in our hearts and in the local game.
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