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PORTUGAL MASTERSOctober 16, 2008Jyoti RandhawaVILAMOURA, PORTUGAL RODDY WILLIAMS: Thank you very much for coming in and joining us, very well done, a good round there and that gives you a share of the clubhouse lead on a perfect day for golf. Talk about what must have been a very enjoyable day today. JYOTI RANDHAWA: Yeah, it was great. I enjoyed playing in the sun. It reminds me of back home, nice and sunny Portugal, but back home this time, it's pretty hot and humid and the weather is getting better there, too. It is supposed to be like this in India this week but it's hot. I like the heat and the sun on the course today. The greens and the golf course you haven't have it better. It beautiful, fantastic. RODDY WILLIAMS: And a welcome return to form. JYOTI RANDHAWA: Yeah, I had a great season starting the year and just fell apart a bit in the middle and I had a top finish in the PGA, and then I've been struggling a bit, so. I guess I had a little bit rust in between the two months, I had to take almost two months off, not off in terms, I had a fever and would come and go for a few weeks in the U.K. I didn't play for a good two months competitively and I think when you come back, you get a little rusty. So it's good to be back and good to be playing well now again. Q. What kind of fever? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Just some kind of bug. Especially I missed the Scottish Open and I missed the Irish Open and then I missed Gleneagles, so a few tournaments I had to pull out. I played one round in Gleneagles and I had to pull out the next. It was just fatigue, I guess I've been travelling too much. Q. Was it just tiredness? JYOTI RANDHAWA: I think it was more exhaustion and the fever came because of that. I got myself fully checked, nothing wrong, so happy with that. Q. A tough golf course but there are opportunities out there? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Yeah, there is. You can really go for it in a few places, but a few places you have to be a little careful because the water comes into play a lot of times and I think the way the rough is set up, if you miss on the wrong side, it will be tough to make par there. As long as you are hitting it well, it's a good scoring golf course. Q. It's an exciting time for golf in India? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Yeah, how golf is going the last ten years, it's unbelievable. I remember playing on the Indian Tour, we have an Indian Tour, about 20-odd tournaments, it's called the PGTI, and I remember a few years back we used to play for nothing, just for fun and now the prize money has grown. The last five years players have started coming out and playing well. There are 15, 20 players playing on the Asian Tour, that's how I came here, we have about three guys here and now playing to play in America for a few years. I would say now golf is second to cricket and cricket, is a religion in my country you can't beat that. It's Bollywood, cricket and now golf. To be top three, for golf to be there, beating tennis, football, hockey I think it's great how golf has come up. Q. So to be the best Indian golfer would be good? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Oh, yeah, a lot of people, you read and look up and any golfing event, I think you talked about in India, there's a lot of golf going on in the country. I'm not the best. Jeev is probably the best but it's great to be there. Q. So do you feel like Tennis and Hockey have gone backwards? JYOTI RANDHAWA: I would say so. Tennis is still there because of the world champions in doubles, Mahesh Bhupath and Leander Paes. But hockey, I don't see it doing anything. I guess you only get better if you perform the sport. It's on its way. I don't think our country has enough funding for a hockey team or a football team like in Europe, you get millions of pounds for a footballer, but India, you can hardly survive being a footballer, so that's the sad part. But it's coming up and getting better, hopefully it should be better in the next few, five, six years to come. Q. Do you get recognised walking down the street? JYOTI RANDHAWA: No, I don't get mobbed or anything. Nobody knows me on the streets. It's only golf courses and airports sometimes and a few parties, but I think it's still the local people, the average people don't know much about golf. You know what, five years back, nobody bothered. Even the golf clubs, but now they come up and see you and take some autographs so you get off the plane and there are a few guys taking autographs and that never happened five years back, never. My wife is in Bollywood, yeah, as I said Bollywood is No. 1, she's more famous. She did a movie and I think she's doing another movie in January sometime. She didn't come here because she has to -- what do you call, when you sell a movie, you have to promote the movie. She is promoting a movie right now which is releasing in a month's time. Q. If you win you could produce her next movie? JYOTI RANDHAWA: I don't think -- I think I need to save that money, because if it still doesn't get ahead, you've lost it all. Q. Have you ever had any auditions or parts? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Well, models for a company, McDonald's in India, it's like an alcohol company with soda. We don't advertise alcohol but we can advertise soda. It's a golfing -- we are into golf and then they took me as a brand ambassador and now I'm with one of the financial companies in India, so I guess I'll be going. Q. What did your wife get for her films? JYOTI RANDHAWA: £80,000. This is a start-up thing, you know, but the No. 1 actress I would say would get about half a million pounds, actress. I think the top studio gets three or four million dollars for a movie. So the thing in movies, when you start out, you don't get anything. You have to be famous and then people know you and then like a golfer, if nobody knows you, nobody cares. Q. Do you get similar coverage to your wife in the papers JYOTI RANDHAWA: Yeah, I think I would say so, yeah, golf is good, we had the Indian Open last week, it was all over the papers and all over the news. The last two years I won the Indian Open. Yeah, I would say that we do get that much coverage, but I guess I'm not that beautiful. (Laughter) So I don't get what I need. I think it's more about how you look, also. She looks great. Q. Do you have an idea of the prize money on your Tour? JYOTI RANDHAWA: We play for about $200,000 for a tournament. You know, that's pretty good. We have five or six of those $200,000 ones, and the rest of about one 100,000, 80,000 tournaments. 20 weeks, that's a lot. A lot of nations don't have a tour to play on but there is one in India and that's why there's growth in India. But the 200,000 is about six events. The rest, the 14, are one hundred and below. Q You and your wife haven't put your money in shares have you? I stopped looking at the stock market. Almost all of the savings and mutual funds -- you know, that's 50 per cent down, so I need to play better golf now. In India, the stock market is 50 per cent down from January. Thanks for the pressure! Q. Put it in a building society? JYOTI RANDHAWA: Well, they say you have to last three, four, five years, and I'm there for the long term, so I hope, I hope. You need to pull up, the Europeans and the Americans need to pull up, because the thing is, the backlog is coming into Asia. RODDY WILLIAMS: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
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