Forgetting the club rules at Pine Valley once, I absent-mindedly tipped the locker room attendant after some unusually filthy shoes had been spotlessly cleaned. A polite but firm rebuke was his response as he handed the cash back. Clubs that make their tipping policy clear do guests a service.

The authorities at Sydney airport should follow suit. When the day job took me to Australia recently, my golf bag was scrutinised on arrival by wary-looking quarantine inspectors. The clubs survived this test but my shoes still bore traces of a miserably wet round in Shanghai and were promptly whisked away.