Unplayable Ball- Rule 28

Oxford Country and Golf Club is a spectacular golf course located just outside Pune close to the Pune- Mumbai highway. The course is located on a hilly terrain, with sloping curves and a lot of dog legs. Oxford recently hosted the Western India Amateur for men and ladies.
The main challenge the course posed was tall red grasses, just off the fairways. If a player missed the fairways, he is in big trouble as it is difficult to find the ball. Even, if the ball was found, it was mostly unplayable and the unplayable ball Rule 28 was invoked frequently. The tournament witnessed  a lot of delays and the round was taking nearly 6 hours to finish due to these factors.
As a Rules Official, I was invoved in an interesting incident. The 9th hole of Oxford had a lot of fairway bunkers. In the middle of the bunker, there was a mound of the signature tall red grasses and this portion of tall red grass was considered as through the green. One of the leading women player in contention for the title, teed off from the 9th tee and landed smack in the core of the mound of tall red grasses, surrounded on all sides by the bunker. She declared the ball unplayable. As the ball was lying through the green, I indicated the three available options- back to previous shot, in line with flag and ball, any distance behind or 2 clublengths from the ball not nearer the hole. She chose the 2 clublengths option. As the mound of  tall grasses  was a small concentric circle with a diameter of about 1 feet and the bunker was intervening in the drop area, the player was under the impression, she can drop ouside the bunker(2 clublengths from the edge of the bunker). I corrected her and told her she can drop the ball in the bunker, must be within  2 clublengths from the ball. She was under the wrong notion that since the original ball was through  the green, the drop also should be through the green.My ruling in this case is also supported by decision 28/4.


Many players have the same wrong notion. The free relief options for Rule 24-2(Immovable obstructions) and R 25-1(Abnormal Ground conditions) spell out specific relief procedures for a ball lying through the Green, a ball in a bunker or a ball on the Putting Green. In the case of a penalty drop for Unplayable ball under R 28, no such restrictions apply for a ball lying through the Green or on a Putting Green. The only restriction for the drop under R 28 is for a ball in the bunker-for the inline /2 clublength option, the ball must be dropped in the bunker.