There Was A Dispute In My Four-Ball About This Ruling. Who Was Right?

Amateur golf can sometimes be a scrappy affair. There are days when you’re just not on your game and getting the ball into the hole seems a monumental challenge. We’ve all had games like that. Sometimes poor play within a group is contagious and playing partners and opponents can be dragged down by your dodgy golf.

That’s just what happened in a four-ball match I was competing in over the weekend. I could barely keep it on the planet and was relying heavily, almost solely, on my playing partner for the first six holes. He was keeping things together and holding the game at all-square.

On the 7^th though, he teed off and hit an exceptional block – 50 yards right into the trees. I then teed off and, by some miracle found the fairway. Our opponents did something similar, one of them sliced, the other found the semi rough. My partner and the opponent who headed right went into the trees and both found their balls. They both chipped back to the fairway and then both played good third shots onto the green. Our other opponent then hit his approach shot into a penalty area short of the putting surface. I went back to the day’s dodgy swing and duffed one totally. So bad it was short of the water. I then played onto green for three. Our opponent dropped and fluffed it back into the pond and gave up.

On the green, our remaining opponent holed a raking putt for a four. Much to our annoyance. But he was immediately matched by my partner who holed a snake of his own for a halving four. I could do no better than four, so I then picked up.

So it was a half then… But was it? Standing at the next tee, my partner took his ball out of his pocket, ready to tee it up. He looked at it and said, “Wait, that’s not my Titleist 3. Mine has a green line on it.” Our opponent then looked at his ball and realised he had played the Titleist 3 with the green line. They had found each other’s balls in the trees, and both played the wrong one.

Our opponents were adamant that it was a half. As nobody completed the hole according to The Rules. In their opinion, the hole was effectively void, and we remained all square. My partner thought otherwise. He thought that, as I had been the last player standing (with a putt for a four), then we won the hole… I wasn’t sure. So, who was right?

It turns out that my playing partner was right and a quick check of The R&A Rules app confirmed it. Rules Clarification 23.2a/1 tells you how to decide the result of a hole in a four-ball match when no ball is correctly holed out. It says –

“In four-ball match play, if no player completes a hole, the side whose player is last to pick up or be disqualified from the hole wins the hole.”

I was the last to pick up so we won the hole. We were one-up. Our opponents were not best pleased but those are the Rules!

It fairly rattled them, and we went on to win 3&2. It can be worth knowing the Rules well (as my playing partner did) as they can work to your advantage.