Like most weekend golfers I prefer not to play the game for high stakes. One of the rare occasions I did so was when a convivial dinner the evening before a friendly 36-hole foursomes match led to a bet that was ten times my usual maximum. After spending half the night practising putting on the bedroom carpet, my partner and I had one of those miracle days when nothing could go wrong. I drove guiltily home with an embarrassingly large cheque in my pocket.

Our opponents, both close friends and senior scribblers on another newspaper, were the last people I wished to impoverish. I resolved there and then never to play for more money than could easily be spent on buying the vanquished players a really good lunch. When you play well you go to sleep happily replaying the round in your mind and don’t need cash as icing on the cake.