A great place to talk

Jeremy Ellwood chats to Matt Le Tissier about the part golf plays in his life and why Prostate Cancer UK is a charity dear to his heart

- Matt Le Tissier

Golf is a sociable game, isn’t it? Every round brings more than three-and-a-half hours to chat, tease and find out about other people’s lives. When you’ve never met your companion before, that opportunity becomes even greater, especially when they’ve played professional football and pulled on an England shirt.

That’s what happened to me recently at Worplesdon in Surrey, where I played with Southampton legend turned TV pundit, Matt Le Tissier.

Over the early holes we chat about his career, what part golf plays in his life and why Prostate Cancer UK is a charity dear to his heart. He tells me that he signed with Southampton on a YTS scholarship in 1985 and that “the next 17 years went very quickly”. He never planned to stay at one club but is pretty proud that Southampton were never relegated during his time, despite some close calls.

The golf bug

He didn’t play golf growing up, but by the time he hung up his boots he was playing off 8. He was down to 3 before the WHS awarded him a handicap index of 1.4, which he describes as “a bit above my paygrade”.

He tells me he once played golf 19 days in a row, that Jimmy Bullard is the best golfing footballer he’s played with, that tour pro Richard Bland once lodged in his spare room and that he is addicted to the game at 52 years of age.