"Getting the sack is part and parcel of the job."

So when Ernie Els's frustration at his failure to challenge Tiger Woods threatened to get the better of him, he decided to make changes, one of which was to split from IMG and to join the less powerful International Sports Management. More recently, he has parted company with his long-time caddie Ricci Roberts.

Roberts is not your average casualty of the player-caddie merry-go-round.

He and Els were one of the most enduring partnerships in the game, and when the South African won his two US Open titles in 1994 and '97, and when he triumphed at the British Open in 2002, Roberts was on the bag.

But following a knee injury in 2005 which seriously curtailed his season, Els has struggled to reach the high standards he sets for himself. With Woods becoming increasingly dominant, and with Phil Mickelson finally applying his talents to the pursuit of major championships, Els has been found wanting.

The only time he has contended in a major during the past two years was at last summer's British Open where he finished third, five strokes behind Woods.

"I haven't felt I've been on top of my game since 2005, " was how he summed up the situation before kicking off his season at this week's Qatar Masters.

There had been a temporary split with Roberts in September, and even when player and caddie reunited for Els's South African Open victory last month - his only win in 2006 - it was clear that the slate was about to be wiped clean. And as Roberts stepped out of the picture, an Irishman stepped in.

When his phone went, JP Fitzgerald was presented with the sort of offer he couldn't refuse. As someone who was at Paul McGinley's side during the Ryder Cup at the Belfry, and as someone who had carried Darren Clarke's bag when he won the NEC Invitational, a high-profile world golf championship event, it wasn't as if Fitzgerald was a greenhorn. But there wouldn't have been even a pretence of hesitation when Els came calling.

"JP happens to be in the right place at the right time, " says Chubby Chandler, the South African's manager.

"Ernie and Ricci are such close friends that the caddying part of it was putting a strain on their relationship.

You get that familiar that you can be so hard on one another. Some of the motivation can disappear between a player and a caddie, and Ernie sees this as a new start. New season, new caddie, just brightens everything up a bit."

While there are few more appealing caddying jobs in world golf, Fitzgerald is bound to feel some pressure as Els sets out on a new stage in his career. If the world number five continues to tread water, the replacement caddie could be perceived to be part of the problem. However, Chandler doesn't see any element of a gamble in Fitzgerald's appointment.

"It's an important move in that you don't want to have a new guy on the bag come the Masters in the second week of April, but Ernie will make most of the decisions himself. As long as JP can tell him where the wind is, tell him how far it is and as long as he's supportive, that's all there is to it really. So there's no element of a gamble here."

Fitzgerald spent six days practising with Els in South Africa before the Qatar tournament, and although the 38-year-old Dubliner, who once beat Clarke in the semi-final of the Irish Close championship, has been on the pro circuit for nine seasons, Sky Sports referred to him earlier this week as "JP Fitzpatrick".

If partnerships like those of Woods and Steve Williams, Mickelson and Jim Mackay, and of Els and Roberts are rare enough in the game, there could be a highly lucrative period in store for Fitzgerald if he and his new boss work well together. With estimated basic wages of $1500 a week, and with a 10 per cent cut of a winning cheque, seven per cent for a top-10 finish, and five per cent of any other winnings, the likes of Williams and Mackay could retire right now if they chose to.

Although he has a novel perspective on the player-caddie relationship as he was - and still is after nearly three years - close friends with Pádraig Harrington when he took the caddying job, Ronan Flood is wary of coming out with hard and fast traits that make one caddie better than another.

"If someone asks you what makes a good caddie, it's actually difficult to answer, because so often it's dependent on the player. Pádraig might say that he thinks I'm a good caddie, but if I worked for someone else, they might say that this guy doesn't know what he's doing. There are a lot of very good caddies out there working for players who are not doing that well, and because of that, people don't really rate them. I'm lucky, I'm caddying for one of the best players in the world. My job is a lot easier than the guy who's caddying for someone who's trying to keep his card. I've no doubt that Pádraig would be where he is at the moment whether or not I had been carrying the bag."

Now related by marriage since he tied the knot with Harrington's wife Caroline's younger sister Suzy last month, the stakes are higher for Flood than for most caddies. "I'd say we're better friends now than when we started, " he says. "But we were aware from day one that there was a lot to lose. So, the day it doesn't look like it's working out, we'll stop it."

Fitzgerald is presumably going into the arrangement with Els with his eyes open. Having teamed up with, and subsequently split from, Clarke - widely regarding as one of the more demanding players to work for - he is acutely aware of the insecurity built into the system.

Clarke accepted when he and Fitzgerald parted company following the 2004 Masters that he had been at fault.

"I know I've been very hard on JP, " he said. "My demands were too great, I expected him to pick the right club every time, and while I wasn't jumping down his throat non-stop, I was complaining."

Because he had been working last season with Greg Owen on the PGA Tour, Fitzgerald also had to inform the Englishman he was moving on. Any sort of a split has the potential to lead to recrimination, but by all accounts the two ended their partnership on good terms. Currently ranked number 102 in the world, Owen would have understood why his caddie had accepted Els's offer.

The ripple effect of Fitzgerald joining forces with Els means that Roberts, who had caddied for Graeme McDowell for a time last year, might now team up with the promising young South African, Charl Schwartzel, while McDowell is back in tandem with Ken Conboy.

"The change of caddie is part of the three-year-plan Ernie has talked about, " says Chandler. "All part of a new strategy, and a new motivation to get back where he thinks he should be. I believe the partnership will work, and JP's probably the luckiest caddie around at the moment, because he's got Ernie at exactly the right time."

Although in his line of work, a handshake is the closest JP Fitzgerald comes to job security, this might just be a golden handshake.