Ever since first meeting fellow Aussie Adam Scott at a European Tour event in north of England two decades ago this coming June, he has been always one of the nicest guys in golf.
Adam is currently back home in Queensland with his young family and like of all us, simply looking to keep safe during this current COVID-19 crisis.
However in a phone-a-friend moment, Adam reached out to a fellow golfer living over 1,000 klms away to the south, and someone who had always called Adam his golfing buddy but with the pair never having met.
What follows is a story that goes right to the heart of this game we all so dearly love.
Ross Campbell, 76 has been playing golf for much of his life but he’s currently struggling with severe brain and lung tumours but is hasn’t stopped Campbell, and a longtime fan of Adam’s, to speak of Adam as his longtime golf buddy everytime Ross would go out to play golf or sit around the clubhouse.
In his dreams, a seriously ill Sydney man, Ross Campbell, has a round of golf regularly with the 2013 Masters champion Adam Scott. So Mr Campbell was delighted to find Scott on the other end of the phone.https://t.co/ZBebilsZFi
— The Sydney Morning Herald (@smh) April 28, 2020
The couple live now in rural Dural and located on the north-west outskirts of Sydney and with his favourite course being Riverside Oaks. The course has played host to a number of high-profile Australasian Tour events including the 1988 Australian PGA Championship, and an event I attended that those who know ‘the story’ is where I bizarrely got into the deep end of golf reporting in receiving a phone call of a different kind.
Though this story is about Ross and the interstate phone call he received from his ‘mate’, Adam.
“Ross thinks a shed on the property is the Riverside Oaks club house and he talks about Adam all the time, waiting for Adam’s call to play a round of golf,” said his wife, Pam in an article in the Sydney Morning Herald.
And with her husband desperately struggling with his illness, Pam reached out to Adam, who is residing in his house on the Sunshine Coast to the north of Brisbane, and she spoke of being left in tears when the phone rang and it was Australia’s first Masters champion on the other end of the line.
“They talked golf and Ross mentioned that he gets very wobbly in the legs when he goes out to play,” said Pam. “He’s in a wheelchair and can hardly stand up but Adam must have sensed this and said he gets wobbly in his legs, too.
“He’s always loved Adam Scott, particularly because he is Australian.
“Many high-profile athletes must get so many requests to put themselves out, yet Adam responded to my daughter’s request straight away.
“The video he sent also shows him practicing putting and Ross can watch it any time he feels inclined.”
Earlier this year, Scott briliantly muscled his way back inside the top-10 on the World Rankings, and in the process thumbing his nose at many observers who were all too quick to downplay any final round heroics, in capturing the Tiger Woods hosted Genesis Invitational on the famed Riviera club outside of Santa Monica.
Adam has already been singled out in many quarters for his kindness in this Coronavirus crisis that has affected the daily lives of practically everyone on the planet.
