Sydney - Famously egalitarian Australians have turned on
local hero Greg Norman after reporters sent to the Bahamas to cover
his wedding to former top tennis player Chris Evert complained of
being roughed up by security guards in the Caribbean paradise.
The Sunday papers were full of diatribes against Norman for
pandering to journalists when it suited him but hiring heavies to
keep them at bay when it didn't.
'You could have won the world over with a little courtesy,
manners, patience and humour,' wrote influential columnist Gary
Linnell in the Daily Telegraph. 'But instead you used goons and an
iron fist.'
Norman and Evert, both 53, are reported to have spent millions of
dollars on this weekend's Nassau nuptials. They had expected to swap
vows at a Paradise Island sunset ceremony Saturday on a beach but
changed plans when a media contingent was spotted taking up position
within camera shot of the private hotel frontage.
The invited guests included former US president Bill Clinton and
tennis ace Martina Navratilova. Notable absentees are likely to be
Andy Mill, Evert's former husband, and Norman's ex-wife, Laura
Andrassy.
The couples had been very close friends until June 2006 when
Norman shocked the world by filed for divorce from Andrassy, a former
air steward, after 25 years of marriage.
It was a rancorous split with for both Norman and Evert.
It is not the first time Norman has stood accused of bad form. He
was scorned for accepting the honour of carrying the Olympic torch
across the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 2000 when he hadn't lived in
Australia for 30 years.
Linnell was the most cutting of the columnists who got stuck into
the former world No. 1 and longtime Florida resident.
'Greg Norman's dignity and class disappeared into the treacherous
waters of the Bahamas in the same manner many of his golf shots once
did when he was under pressure in a major,' the tart columnist wrote.
USA
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