​There’s nothing quite like the sound and the sight of a purely struck golf shot. You know, the whoosh, the fizz, the jaw-dropping speed and trajectory that’s akin to a fighter jet hurtling away from an aircraft carrier?No, I wouldn’t know anything about that golfing sensation either. Let’s face it, you’ve probably got more chance of glimpsing the critically endangered blue-eyed ground dove as you have of seeing me hit a corker out of the screws.Apparently, authorities on all things avian once believed that the aforementioned dove had been extinct for almost 70 years until evidence of its existence was unearthed again in 2015.I’m hoping my golf game, which seems to have vanished off the face of the earth, enjoys a similarly startling reappearance.Forget a lesson from a PGA pro, though. I probably need conservation assistance from the good folk at Bird Life International.But I’m waffling on here. As usual. I’d started this column by mentioning sweetly clattered strikes and over the past couple of weeks I’ve witnessed plenty of those during the Scottish Open, The Open and the Women’s Scottish Open.The Scottish scribblers didn’t exactly have a cast of thousands to deal with on the home front, mind you. We had, for instance, just two Scots competing in The Open, namely Robert MacIntyre and Jack McDonald, and a similar number, in Gemma Dryburgh and Hannah Darling, at the Women’s Scottish Open.Slim pickings indeed. Some of you may be asking, “so, where’s the next wave coming from?” Your guess may be as good as mine.Yes, there are some good amateur talents in the likes of Connor Graham, Niall Shiels-Donegan and the Girls’ Under-16 champion Carly McDonald, but it’s hardly been a vintage season.In America, the USGA has officially launched the U.S. National Development Program, designed to create a unified pathway that nurtures top Americans through the junior and amateur ranks to the pinnacle of the sport, back in 2023.Beginning that year, the program funded 50 juniors and the number has grown each year so that by 2027, the program will fund 1,000 juniors across the country and impact thousands more. The Junior National Team launched in 2024 with the Amateur National Team forming the following year and the Young Professional Team in 2026.But in Scotland, the results of this summer’s various European Amateur Team Championships were meager. The men, relegated out of the top flight the other year, finished fifth out of nine teams in division two. The women were 18th out of 22, the boys came in 14th out of 16 and the girls were 12th out of 19.These results got me thinking about an aspirational strategy that was unveiled by the then Scottish Golf Union a number of years ago.In a meaty blueprint, the high heads of the amateur governing body declared that, “by 2020 Scotland will be the world leading golfing nation” while having “the most comprehensive player pathway to develop golfers from entry level to elite levels in the