To the horror of some of golf's more puritanical traditionalists, the talk at The Belfry yesterday was all about football.
Three of the European Tour's better-known stars - Liverpool fans Thomas Bjorn and Darren Clarke and West Ham United nut Paul McGinley - have their sights seemingly set only on getting to Saturday's FA Cup Final.
But there's another Ryder Cup contender who had a less celebrated standard of football on his mind as he prepared for today's Quinn Direct British Masters at The Belfry, Atherstone fan Paul Broadhurst.
Broadhurst is seventh in Europe's points list, thanks to his resurgence in form over the past 18 months, highlighted in two victories, both in Portugal.
He already heads a lot of more-fancied contenders. And, if he can keep his form ticking over at any sort of consistent level now as the European Tour finally hits the European mainland, he could compete against the Americans at the K Club in September.
But, while Broadhurst's thoughts will be turned this morning only to his 7.50 tee-off time, last night they were at The Hawthorns watching his beloved Adders, the reformed Atherstone Town, secure the third leg of a non-League treble.
The Adders dropped out of the Southern League in September 2003 but they made a successful return to action last season, just at the time Broadhurst, revitalised after a career-threatening wrist injury, was announcing his return with a win at the Estoril Open.
He followed up by winning the Algarve Open at Penina six weeks ago and the Adders, too, have enjoyed success after success. After the thrill of seeing one of his three sons, Alex, perform on the pitch at Sheepy Road in a half-time penalty competition in last week's Midland Combination title win, he watched Atherstone seal a euphoric treble last night with a 2-1 victory over Worcestershire side Feckenham in the Endsleigh Challenge Cup final. And, in Broadhurst's world, it matched anything he might do at The Belfry.
Broadhurst has never previously had too much fun round the course but the Atherstone golfer may represent this week's best chance of a local winner.
"You've just got to drive it well," he said. "The greens are looking pretty reasonable. And, if it stays like this, with all the rain on Monday making the fairways and the greens a bit softer and easier to hit, scoring should be pretty good."
Broadhurst comes into this event knowing that his latest win in Portugal was in the middle of three missed cuts. But he says: "My game's not far away. I didn't play well in Italy last week, having had a four-week break.
"Although I've never really done any good out in the Far East in the humidity, I felt as if I needed to play and just made a couple of bad errors in the cuts I missed in Singapore and in China, whereas last week I drove it poorly and I didn't make any putts.
"But it's not as if I'm shooting cricket scores. The worst I've had this year is a 74 and the difference between that and a 70 is very little."
John Bickerton, too, is returning to his best after his near-miss in Spain a fortnight ago, and the Worcestershire man - 19th in the Ryder Cup points table - is a lunchtime starter today (12.40).
Also going off the first tee will be Wolverhampton's Peter Baker (8.40am) and The Belfry's own Tom Whitehouse (9am). And there is also a morning start for that other son of Atherstone, Steve Webster, who will look to improve his position of 57th in the Order of Merit when he tees off from the tenth at 9 o'clock.
