Ireland’s Damien McGrane declared he was left with no option but to report now banned caddy, Mathias Vinson after the Argentinean tried to hide a 15th and illegal club belonging to Spain’s Jose Manuel Lara during the first round of the BMW International Open in Munich.

Lara, who knew nothing about his caddy’s actions, is still responsible for the actions of his caddy and was later disqualified.

McGrane became suspicious when he saw Lara’s caddy heading into bushes at the back of the second tee, and carrying Lara’s bag and also assuming it was not ‘call to nature’.

Damien McGrane left with no option but to report cheating caddy. (Photo - Eoin Clarke/www.golffile.ie)

When approached, Vinson realised e errors of his way and started apologising profusely before advising Lara he had 15 clubs in the bag and one more than the legal number.

“It was very unfortunate for Jose Manuel but I came here to play golf, and I didn’t come here to being in the wrong place at the right time,” said McGrane.

“His caddy just made a serious error of judgement on the second tee box.  I happened to notice it straight away and he admitted what he was doing was silly, stupid and crazy so I do admire him for admittinng it striaght away.

“But it was just unfortunate I happened to be the player to notice it.

“I certainly took from my game as I came here to play golf as I finished plus four and I was lucky because today I got back to two under par with a 66.”

It meant a two-stroke penalty to Lara for each of the two holes he played with a maximum of a four stroke penalty in the Spaniard’s eventual round of 73.

However McGrane then brought the matter to the notice of Chief Referee, John Paramour straight after the trio completed their rounds.

Paramour’s initial comment was:  “It is so bizarre I will have to go away to think about it.”

Paramour returned less than 30 minutes later to advise Lara he was disqualified from the Euro 2m tournament given the player is responsible for a caddies action.

“Jose Manuel’s caddy noticed he had a 15th club and on the second hole he attempted to lose it in a thick bush,” said Paramour.

“He was seen entering the bush with the bag of clubs by his playing partners (Ireland’s Damien McGrane and Swede Peter Hedblom), who thought it was a little bit suspicious.

“They went and asked the chap: ‘What are you doing?’ and he sort of fumbled out an answer saying ‘I’ve got this wrong – I’ve done something bad. I wish it hadn’t happened, etc etc’.

“It was clear the club was out of the bag and in the bush at the time. He admitted it straight away and regretted his action.

“A ruling was sought over what was the penalty for carrying an extra club and he was given two shots for the first hole and two for thesecond.”

Vinson, like Lara had been caught in a traffic jam coming to the course and actually alighted from the car he was in to jog the three kilometresof so to the course.

Lara arrived at the course from his Dusseldorf hotel and with just around an hour before his tee off.

In his haste, Vinson missed noticing the 15th club in Lara’s bag.

“Hopefully we won’t have too many more of those,” added Paramour.

“We interviewed the player and are perfectly satisfied that he had no knowledge of what was going on.

“It was clearly the caddie doing what he felt at the time was the right thing, but was clearly the wrong thing. He’s kind of been asked notto come back and that’s how the matter has been resolved.”

The incident immediately rekindled memories of the bizarre 15th club incident involving Masters champion, Ian Woosnam at the 2001 British Open and at Royal Lytham and St. Annes that will again play host to golf’s oldest Major next month.

Ireland’s Miles Byrne suggested to Woosnam he would ‘bombalistic’ when he was informed he was carrying 15 clubs for the Welshman.

The incident also cost Woosnam a two stroke penalty, any chance of capturing a first British Open title, a £225,000 first prize cheque and a potential place in the European Ryder Cup team.

Paramour was the referee also on that occasion.