ONE of professional golf’s biggest sponsors has urged the sport’s decision makers to be “brave” in entering a new era.

Giles Morgan, the head of sponsorship at HSBC, believes the game has to adapt to changes in society in a similar way to other sports have tried different things successfully.

Morgan was speaking after entering a year in which his company is due to see its golf contracts up for renewal but he feels there has to be fresh ideas for the relationship to continue to work.

HSBC back a number of tournaments, including the WGC Champions event in Shanghai, the women’s match-play as well as last week’s Abu Dhabi Golf Championship which attracted some of golf’s biggest names.

“It’s a crossroads moment,” Morgan said. “I think that we will look back over this period and see where golf has gone. There are lots of positives abut golf but the world, particularly with digital communications and people’s time, has changed in the last 15 years beyond anybody’s wildest dreams. I’m not sure golf has kept up with the change.

“And therefore, because it attracts high investment, has famous superstars, its men and women, its old and young and relatively healthy, there are lots of good reasons it can look at all of the ingredients and then re-bake the cake.”

Martin Slumbers takes over from Peter Dawson as the boss at the R&A this year, while the European Tour are set to appoint a successor to chief executive George O’Grady. Such moves provide an opportunity for change.

“I don’t think the sport’s in trouble but I do think that those who are in charge of the game need to be brave,” Morgan told the BBC. “They need to take some risks.

“Noone could have said 25 years ago that Twenty20 cricket would be the success it is and has grown. It doesn’t mean that through Test cricket those who are the purists don’t still get their diet.”

One of his big suggestions is to embrace the foursomes alternate shot format and bring together the top men and women at the same events.

AN electrician from Middlesbrough is looking to light up Morocco with his golf swing next month.

Chris Wall, an amateur golfer, heads to Morocco on February 8-14 looking to secure a prestigious national title in the grand final of the Morocco Matchplay, powered by HowDidiDo.

The expenses-paid trip is reward for his effort in battling through local rounds and a regional final at Staley Hall, Northumberland, during 2014, in a competition open to any golfer who is a member of an affiliated club with an officially recognised handicap.

Wall, 57, an eight-handicapper who plays his golf at Middlesbrough GC, will enjoy complimentary return flights to Morocco, six-nights’ accommodation at the five-star L’Amphitrite Palace hotel, in Skhirat and five rounds of golf, at both the Royal Golf Dar Essalam, which hosted the last Moroccan Open in 2001, won by Ryder Cup star Ian Poulter, and the Tony Jacklin Casablanca.

More than 460,000 golfers currently use the HowDidiDo website. The brand is also the driving force behind two of the best supported amateur golf events in the UK: the annual Titleist Order of Merit – the largest golf event of its kind in the country – and the Morocco Matchplay.