The Home of The Official UAE Scratch League

As we get ready for the Scratch League season, we have a major announcement regarding the schedule and a new Committee member who will be joining us.

Firstly, we would like to extend a warm welcome to Paul Bryson from The Ranches to the Scratch League Committee.  Mike Mezei will be stepping down from the Committee moving forward; if there are any other players interested in supporting the League on the Committee, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

After discussions with the EGF, Scratch League Committee and some previous Captains, we have decided to move the timing of the League schedule to coincide with the calendar year.  The playing of the Scratch League Final between Trump and the Creek will proceed as planned this fall, with the upcoming regular season starting on January 1st, 2024 and ending in December 2024 (or earlier).

This change has been discussed previously and there were many drivers for adjusting the season timing.  As Ramadan moves forward in the calendar there is increased pressure on the golf clubs in the January-May time frame, which is also their busiest time for corporate events, tourist play, club championships, etc.  The EGF OOM schedule is also heavily loaded into that part of the season, making it difficult to get all of the teams together on the weekends and schedule critical season ending matches and finals with the clubs (and potentially impacting participation in the EGF OOM events).  As you all know, we’ve had a few instances (like this past season) where we felt this crunch and the finals could not be completed before summer.  With the new schedule timing, we can get as many matches as realistically possible in the January-May time frame, leaving us September-December to complete the remaining matches and play the finals with a firm deadline to finish by mid-Dec.  This change will also help alleviate players being “Cup Tied” when they change clubs during the calendar year, which used to be in the middle of our season.  We also hope that this schedule change puts more matches in a less congested time frame that is preferable to the golf clubs who generously host us gratis to play our weekend matches.

If you have any questions or concerns, please reach out to Robert Fiala with the EGF or the Scratch League Committee members (Khalid, Graeme, Manan & Paul).

Sincerely,

The Scratch League Committee