One of six players to come through pre-qualifying on Monday, Eaves is playing in his second Australian PGA Championship having also qualified in 2017, making the 36-hole cut “before fatigue set in” and finishing 75th.

In 2015 Eaves finished 73rd on the PGA Tour of Australasia Order of Merit with a best finish a tie for 10th at the TX Civil & Logistics WA PGA Championship but it wasn’t enough to retain his card, a poor week at Q School in January leaving him with only secondary status on the Japan Golf Tour but without the funds to pursue it.

So now Eaves’ regular game is with the Warwick Sporters Golf Club every Wednesday afternoon where a flubbed flop shot doesn’t come with the same consequences that he will experience over the coming days.

“It’s just the mid-week comp at the club. It’s a club within the club basically,” Eaves explained.

“It used to be a lot of businessmen who would play. The guys who ran the car dealerships, the real estate agents, a lot of small business owners.

“They’d get up there by lunch and play their game of golf in the afternoon. It used to be quite big.”

Eaves came close to qualifying to play at RACV Royal Pines Resort this week at the PGA Professionals Championship at Hamilton Island in November, his third-place finish one shy of what was required to earn a place in the field.

But despite the somewhat sarcastic encouragement of his wife Kim, he dusted himself off and shot 67 to snare one of just three places on offer at Lakelands Golf Club on Monday, his tournament to begin on the 10th tee at 8am Thursday morning.

“Before I went to Hamilton Island Kim, who is my biggest fan, wished me good luck but said, ‘I can’t afford for you to qualify because I can’t take the week off work. Good luck but don’t play too well’,” said Eaves, who has a five-year-old son and another on the way.

“I gave her the best result possible and came third.

“On Sunday before I came down to the Gold Coast I said to her, ‘I know you don’t really want me to qualify so I’ll just go out there and do whatever.’

“So again she said, ‘Good luck, but don’t qualify.’

“But when I rang to tell her on Monday she was very excited and immediately said she was taking Thursday and Friday off.”

As he did two years ago Eaves will have his Maryborough-plumbing younger brother Andrew on the bag this week.

It’s yet another taste of what life could have been like but a reminder of why the former City Golf Club trainee chose the camaraderie of a golf club instead.

“It’s cool catching up but I feel very out of place,” said Eaves, who took a Warwick Golf Club team to the Volkswagen Scramble National Final in May and was 0.2 shots from featuring in the playoff.

“Driving to the course I was telling myself that I had just as much right as anyone else playing this week, I did the hard yards in a three-spotter qualifier.

“And then I get here and immediately feel out of place.

“I always thought I could sneak away and play a few pro-ams but it just got really difficult to line up all the ducks at work.

“I love getting away and getting those competitive juices flowing but it just didn’t quite match up, particularly with the travel. It was just a touch far away.

“I do miss it but I’m glad I don’t do it anymore.

“I get great interaction with everyone at the club and love building those relationships with people.

“I’m there to earn a living but you’re also there to care for people’s golf and if you show them that you actually care then the money side tends to look after itself.”

That’s not to say he doesn’t still dare to dream.

“When I qualified on Monday I messaged my mate Ryan Haller and told him I’d qualified for the PGA,” Eaves added.

“I said, ‘I might be on the European Tour next year!’”