Jenny Lee Smith to attend Royal Lytham as inaugural Women’s Open champion and reflects on Kevin Keegan

Jenny Lee Smith will be present at Royal Lytham as a guest of the R&A for the Women’s Open when the championship begins on Thursday. The first Women’s Open champion has been reflecting on her 1976 victory and on the recent death of Kevin Keegan, which prompted memories of their shared past.

Smith’s arrival at Royal Lytham carries the weight of history: she was the inaugural winner of what became the Women’s Open and has been invited by the R&A to mark the tournament’s latest edition. Golf commitments in the United States prevented her from accepting the North East Sports Personality of the Year award for 1982 in person. She did, however, attend the following year’s event to present the trophy to Kevin Keegan. His death last week shocked Smith, prompting her to reflect back on that time and offering a snapshot of her sporting status at a time when Keegan was wooing Tyneside.

“It is very sad,” says Smith of Keegan’s death, aged 75. “We did a lot of work together because I was sponsored at the time by Scottish and Newcastle Breweries, who did the same for the football team. He became a good friend and was such a lovely chap.”

Those commercial ties underpinned their public association: Smith’s sponsorship from Scottish and Newcastle Breweries linked her to some of the same corporate relationships that supported the football side with which Keegan was involved. The shared sponsorship arrangements explain how the pair came to appear together at regional events and awards ceremonies. Smith’s presence to hand over the North East accolade the year after she missed it is one example of that crossover between sports figures and local business backers.

Smith’s recollections of that period underline how athletes from different codes interacted through community and corporate events. Her memories, prompted by Keegan’s passing, bring into focus both her own prominence in women’s golf and the broader sporting culture of the era. The anecdote about the awards night captures a moment when her profile and Keegan’s were both rising in the public eye.

Her attendance at Royal Lytham this week will reunite the tournament’s present with its origins, with Smith representing the event’s early history as the game continues to evolve. The recent loss of Keegan has drawn those earlier associations back into view for her and for others who remember that era.