It was all happening in 2014.

The Ryder Cup, Commonwealth Games, the World Stone Skimming Championships . . . Just about the only thing that didn't take place in Scotland over the past year was the European Champions League of Shadow Puppetry. And they're probably costing that one up as we speak.

The diary can fill up quickly and we're never done throwing our hats into the various rings of opportunity. With the bidding process set to get underway for the 2019 Solheim Cup, it would be no surprise to see Scotland, the home of golf, installed as host venue favourites should those charged with bringing big bashes to this country press ahead and go for it.

The spectacularly successful staging of September's Ryder Cup at Gleneagles helped to elevate the cradle of the game to new heights on the global scene but Paul Bush, the chief operating officer of EventScotland, insists we can ill afford to rest on our laurels and must continue to look forward ambitiously. "We did meet with John Solheim and representatives from the Ladies European Tour during the Ryder Cup and they were hugely impressed; it was difficult not to be given what was delivered that week," reported Bush.

"That has given us a good pedigree but we can't be too blase and arrogant about the Ryder Cup."

The Solheim Cup, the biennial skirmish between the best female golfers from Europe and the USA, was last staged on Scottish soil back in 2000 at Loch Lomond. The only other time it has been here was in 1992, at Dalmahoy. Expressions of interest for hosting the 2019 match need to be made to the tour by the end of January 2015 and Bush and the relevant bodies involved are now poring over the various documents and information packs that were sent out recently before deciding upon the next plan of attack.

In the immediate, triumphant aftermath of the Ryder Cup, Alex Salmond, the First Minister, had suggested that Gleneagles would now need to host "a very special golf tournament, something that is not just another tour event."

The engrossing, fluctuating fortunes of matchplay golf is the kind of format that would suit the Perthshire resort to a tee. Then again, it would suit a few Scottish venues. "I don't think it would be too much too soon [for Gleneagles after the Ryder Cup] but there will be other Scottish courses wanting to throw their hat into the ring," added Bush, who is anticipating plenty of interest in the Solheim Cup from the other home nations as well as Scandinavia, where the women's game is particularly strong.

While not the colossal, global beast that the Ryder Cup has become, the Solheim Cup continues to grow in stature and the fact that a rejuvenated Team Europe has won the last two tussles has certainly helped galvanise interest on this side of the pond. That last time the contest was held on European soil, in Ireland in 2011, television viewing figures were up 87 per cent on the previous staging in Europe in 2007.

"We learned so much from the Ryder Cup and we feel we can offer something unique," said Bush. "We have to go through a rational debate, though, and see if we will have a partner that will come in and do it and gauge whether it will stack up commercially. It's not as big as the Ryder Cup but, in an aspirational sense, we have to look at it that way and look at benefitting the women's game as a whole. At the end of the day there has to be some return on that investment for the country and we won't do it for the hell of it.

"But it's a very attractive product and I'd like to think that we can give something that no one else can, in terms of experience, delivery and commerciality."

The new year will continue to see the nation thrust itself into the spotlight. On the golfing front, there is a manic month featuring the Scottish Open, the Open, the Ladies Scottish Open and the Women's British Open. A new tournament on the men's European Tour, driven by Paul Lawrie, is to be unveiled in Aberdeen tomorrow.

In a wider sporting sense, events such as the World Gymnastics Championships, the European Judo Championships, the IPC Swimming World Championships and the FEI European Eventing Championships are scribbled into a rich 2015 diary.

"There was no chance of us sitting back and breathing a sigh of relief," added Bush. "There has been a sea change in confidence of hosting events in recent years. We punch well above our weight but, again , we can't get complacent."

Now, what about that Shadow Puppetry . . .