It has quietly come to light that any golfers competing on tours run by the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA), must speak English.
The language vigilantes seem to be targeting 45 South Korean players, and the fact that eight of those women rank amongst the top 20 earners only serves to highlight the underliying cynicism of the crusade.
For those in question, failing an English Language test will result in an overly officious suspension from the tour. The reason? Well, these succesful Koreans are winning a large portion of the tournaments but are not reaping big-buck rewards for the media moguls behind the scenes, owing to their inability to give post match interviews. Tricky as it is to work out exactly how enlightnening such an interview would be, there seems to be a fairer way of doing things…
Interpreters, anyone?
3 September 2008 14:36