It has been 15 years since golf’s oldest major championship was last held at Turnberry.

It has also been nine years since the staging 2015 AIG Women’s Open and a year after Donald Trump bought the now renamed Trump Turnberry.

However there will be no further R & A sanctioned sanctioned tournaments returning to Turnberry until the present ‘media noise’ still surrounding the Scottish course disappears and the focus is purely on golf.

Trump Turnberry – No return of golf’s oldest major until there is no ‘media noise’ (Image – Shutterstock)

And that will continue to be the scenario according to out-going R&A CEO and Chairman Martin Slumbers speaking with the Golf Channel.

“We are in a position at the moment with respect to Turnberry where we will not be taking any events there until we are comfortable the whole dialogue is about golf”, said Slumbers.

“There is still a situation we are not comfortable with at the moment but that could evolve in the coming years.

The R&A CEO Martin Slumbers  (Image randa)

“I think Turnberry is a fantastic golf course.  A lot of people know that it is my favourite links course. So, I think that poistion is clear and I think there is path forward but only if that situation changes”.

Slumbers was asked to explain what he is not comfortable with.

“When you look at the major championships, we want the whole thing to be purely about the golf course and to be purely about the players that are competing on it,” Slumbers said,

“And to make sure that there’s no sort of media noise that detracts away from the fact that this is a golf championship, the oldest and original golf championship, and that should be the single source of the media coverage.

“I think that’s really important if we’re going to preserve the strength of our events.”