Over the weekend it was brought to my attention that the winners on the European Tour and PGA Tour last week had a combined score of 44-under-par. Yes, 44-under-par! I'd find it hard to argue that today's players are naturally better golfers than the likes of Woods, Mickelson and Singh during their prime; or Faldo, Watson and Seve over their battles; or even as far back as Nicklaus, Player and Palmer. I thought I'd have a little look into the statistics on the PGA Tour and what I found was interesting.

In 2000 there was only one golfer whose average driving distance was above 300 yards and that was John Daly at 301.4 yards. Today there are 83 golfers whose average driving distance is above Daly's back then, with the longest booming his average drive 334.1 yards down the fairway. Ok, so we've established that there is a huge difference in distance off the tee, but what about their shots into the green? Well back in 2000, leading the way in greens in regulation was Tiger Woods at 75.15% which is almost 10% lower than Paul Casey's 2016 average of 84.72%. All these stats surely point to one thing, scoring average coming down - incorrect. It will come as no surprise that Tiger had by far the lowest scoring average in 2000 at an incredible 67.79. Well fast-forward 16 years and we see Adam Scott averaging 'just' 68.13.

So regardless of the huge gains in distance thanks to technology and gym-based conditioning that is advantageous for today's golfers, it seems that it is the tactical nous and the ability to grind out scores which is somewhat missing from today's power-hitters' artilleries - something that the great golfers of the past have always had in abundance.