You don’t need to be Rory McIlroy or Sir Nick Faldo to know that turning up to your local golf course dressed in jeans and trainers is a faux pas. Small wonder then that below-par attire is raising hackles among the members at one of the country’s most prestigious golf clubs
Wentworth, an exclusive golf and country club near the leafy Surrey village of Virginia Water, faces a growing rebellion from members who pay £20,000 a year for the right to play on pristine greens and fairways designed by Ernie Els, the South African golfing great.
Breaches of etiquette such as dress codes — Wentworth has a strict no jeans and trainers policy — and a failure to engage in “respectful interactions” are among the rebels’ complaints. Scruffily dressed patrons appear to be the tip of the iceberg, however.
Wentworth has long been a haven for the rich and the famous, with the wider 1,750-acre estate boasting an eclectic mixture of residents over the years from Agatha Christie to Sir Elton John. The golf club that sits at its heart counts footballers past and present such as John Terry and England captain Harry Kane as members. City grandee Martin Gilbert, the founder of Aberdeen Asset Management, is a director.
Frustration in some quarters has been bubbling away ever since Wentworth fell into the hands of Reignwood — an investment vehicle owned by Chanchai Ruayrungruang, the Thai-Chinese Red Bull billionaire — in 2014.
Reignwood ruffled feathers by cutting Wentworth’s membership from 4,000 to little more than 800, and asked those who stayed on for a one-off payment of £100,000 to buy a debenture membership. Debentures are said to have since risen to £250,000.
The row stepped up a notch last week as leaders of the rebellion penned an email to members setting out their main grievances and urging them to back the convening of an extraordinary general meeting to consider ten demands. The email details efforts to convene an EGM “aimed at formally addressing concerns that many members feel remain unresolved and would benefit from open discussion among all stakeholders”.
It begins by clarifying confusion of the number of signatures needed to convene an EGM. It had previously thought that a 20 per cent threshold needed to be met. But the club has confirmed to the rebels that they need the support of 277 members, 10 per cent of the current membership. Efforts to establish the precise membership, and in turn the number of signatures needed to trigger an EGM, have been hampered by the club member directory being “affected by IT issues, rendering it unavailable”, the correspondence says.
It confirms that Please Woraphanit Ruayrungruang, daughter of Wentworth’s owner and the club’s chief executive, has agreed to fly in for crisis talks with members next month. Should a quorum be established, the email sets out ten draft resolutions for consideration. These include voting in two members to the Wentworth board, reimbursement of fee increases since 2023 worth thousands of pounds each, and employing a “rigorous and transparent” new membership process, that requires all new members to be introduced by at least three existing members
Stricter etiquette controls should be implemented across all club facilities, the demands continue. The aim of this would be to ensure “a respectful environment for all members — including adherence to dress codes, responsible booking habits, and respectful interactions”. One Wentworth member said that the dress code greivance related partly to flouting of the no jeans and trainers rule.
Sources close to the club insist that the rebellion amounts to little more than a lone-wolf crusade. They said signatories of the petition were yet to be verified. Furthermore, they insisted that the rebels were unlikely to meet the threshold to call an EGM, arguing that even if they did, the motions would not be supported. Ruayrungruang’s visit in May is part of her regular engagement with members, sources added.
Since 2016, Reignwood has invested £30 million to enhance the golf courses, clubhouse and other facilities. Those in the Reignwood camp claim that this figure was more than the total amount invested in Wentworth over the previous ten years combined.
All parties declined to comment.
