Duck Hook Golf is growing in popularity, so much so that the Dogs trio behind it have created a tournament for footballers
IT’S YOUR favourite footballers, only in golf gear.
Each week across the next three months, some of the AFL’s best players – from Max Gawn, to Steele Sidebottom, Sam Durham, Ed Richards, Cam Zurhaar and more – will battle it out on the golf course. Better yet, you’ll get the chance to watch it all unfold.
The name of the game is the Duck Hook Classic, and it’s the result of countless hours of planning and preparation from a few Western Bulldogs favourites.
It was more than a year ago that Doggies trio Bailey Dale, Oskar Baker and Anthony Scott started ‘Duck Hook Golf’, a YouTube channel where they pitched and putted their way around links across Victoria and broadcast every moment on their social media pages.
Inspired by the rise of YouTube golf across the globe – the most recent ‘YouTube Invitational’ golf tournament currently has a total viewership of 26.3 million people and counting – the Bulldogs boys decided to create their most ambitious project yet. They’re calling it the Duck Hook Classic.
Across the next 12 weeks, every Melbourne-based AFL club will have representatives in a five-hole, two-against-two scramble golf match to decide which team is best on the course. The action will be broadcast on YouTube daily from Monday evening, pitting the League’s best against each other. Even the umpires have a team.
The project, hosted at the Yarra Valley’s prestigious Heritage Golf and Country Club, will feature a total of 11 scramble golf matches and will incorporate longest drive and closest to the pin competitions to determine the winning club, with prizes and pride on the line.
THE TEAMS – DUCK HOOK CLASSIC
Dale and Scott will guide the action, Baker will roam the course doing interviews, while even Anthony Hudson will jump in for some commentary and hype reels.
It will see Sidebottom pair up with his Collingwood teammate Jeremy Howe, the Hollands brothers represent Carlton, while Tim Taranto and Nathan Broad will make for a formidable Richmond partnership.
As the creators, the Western Bulldogs had to have two teams. Ed Richards, Rory Lobb, Laitham Vandermeer and Matt Kennedy take part, with Dale, Baker and Scott watching on.
The action, which was filmed across the summer, took a lot of networking, coordination and planning. Charles Murray, Duck Hook Golf’s first employee as its Instagram page soared towards 13,000 followers, was influential in getting the project off the ground. But the Doggies boys hope the payoff will be worth both their time and yours.
There’s further hopes that if the competition is a success, it will grow even more. Plans are already being hatched for future editions with non-Victorian clubs, and maybe even all 18 teams, taking part in the action someday soon.
“We know a lot of the AFL boys love their golf,” Scott told AFL.com.au.
“It’s one of the things you can do in your free time as a footballer that keeps you active and healthy, not just physically but also mentally. I know how much I enjoyed it when I was playing, maybe too much if you ask some of the coaching staff.
“We just wanted to combine the network we built through being in the AFL system with our passion, which was running the golf channel. Then we thought it would be a really fun idea to pit ourselves against some of the best players from the Melbourne teams to start off with. Amongst that, we wanted to create a leaderboard to determine who was the best AFL duo.
“We literally just DM’d everyone on Instagram. Because we’ve got our existing friendships from footy, golf and even knowing them through different social avenues, basically everybody was really forthcoming and keen to jump on board with the idea.”
