*Ahoy there, dear readers. Maritime history abounds in this coastal parish. Back in 1217, a Plantagenet English fleet commanded by Hubert de Burgh attacked a French Armada led by Eustace the Monk in a seagoing stooshie known as the Battle of Sandwich. Funnily enough, a similarly titled exchange of hostilities took place in the media canteen yesterday when the diarist pinched the last cheese and pickle sarnie from under the nose of the Daily Telegraph’s peckish golf writer.

*Caution is very much the watchword at this week’s Open as all and sundry try to adhere to the strict pandemic-induced protocols or risk being clobbered by official baton-wielding social distancing enforcement officers. Lateral flow tests are a necessary evil although one particularly droothy scribe, fresh from a sturdy, thirst-quenching gargle in the Zetland Arms the night before, returned something of an eye-opening result when the sample appeared with a head on it.

*For those in peril off the tee. There’s a bunker lurking down the right-hand side of Royal St George’s 13th fairway that was actually created by a jettisoned bomb from a German Heinkel as it was chased back across the channel during the Second World War. The damage sustained then, of course, was nothing compared to the shattering ravages wrought on the fairways by the swipes, thrashes and gouges at the pre-Open media stableford earlier in the year.

*Ah, the glitz and glamour of The Open. The diarist’s golf writing brethren are staying at a variety of hotels, hostels, chalets, dorms and park benches this week. One is even enjoying camping for the bargain price of £11 per night. As Shakespeare didn’t quite write, “now is the summer of our discount tent.”