Confident Justin Rose eager to land his Major target

For Justin Rose, golfing life is a good deal more serious these days than when his reward for achieving his goals was a mars bar or, perhaps, a train set.

“My dad used to encourage me to get out there and play, to set little targets and goals to keep me interested. He just kept it fun for me,” revealed the Englishman ahead of this 144th British Open on the Old Course.

The smile on Rose’s face here yesterday told its own story of such boyhood reflections, but the world number eight, who savoured a breakthrough Major triumph when lifting the US Open at Merion in 2013, has to grapple – like his fellow-English players – with the reasoning behind a failure to lift the Claret Jug.

Nick Faldo, at Muirfield in 1992, was the last English player to win the Open.

And, of all the trophies, this is the one that Rose most dreamt of lifting.

“I had a lot of confidence in myself and belief that I was going to go on and be a professional golfer. I used to pose my follow-through in the garden in the reflection of the window and pretend it was the front cover of a magazine.

“In my mind . . . (playing) Ryder Cups and Major championships, and in the quiet moments, where you’d spend hours after hours on the putting green at your home club, ‘this one of the Open, this one for the Ryder Cup’ . . . always had that dream in my head.”

In fairness to Rose, he has accomplished most of his dreams. The Ryder Cup? Tick, two wins. Majors? Tick, one win; the US Open. WGCs? Tick, one win; the Cadillac Championship. Global player? Tick, 18 career professional wins in Europe, South Africa, Japan and the United States. Been there, done that.

Except, the one he really wants more than any other is an empty box yet to be ticked. The British Open, tantalisingly within touching distance yet out of reach.

Cast our minds back to when it all really kicked off for Rose, when those expectations sky-rocketed.

As a teenager in the British Open at Royal Birkdale in 1998, he holed out from 50 yards on the 72nd hole to finish in fourth place. The following day, he turned professional.

The dream didn’t materialise, and Rose missed 21 consecutive cuts before he managed to earn his first prize cheque.

Character builder

Such darks days seem in the dim and distant past and, indeed, they are. But they also serve as a reminder, a character builder, to Rose of the way it once was.

“I think one of the great things is that I forget most of the things that happen in my golf game, which is probably why I survive missing 21 cuts, sort of selective memory,” he claims of that time.

The upshot, though, is that there is an inner steel that belies his outer demeanour.

Yet, his performances in the British Open, since turning professional, have left a lot to desire. It is remarkable, indeed, that his fourth-place finish as an amateur remains his best-ever finish in the championship. It is his only top-10, and he has missed the cut three times in the last five years.

Why?

“I haven’t put a finger on it,” he confessed. “You know, I can play links golf, I know that for sure. My record may not suggest that but there’s been a couple (of Opens) where I felt I had a great chance to win if a few things had gone my way or if I just got a bit of momentum . . . . . my Open record isn’t great, and I’m looking at righting that the next five or six years.”

Here at St Andrews, where he won the Links Trophy as a starry-eyed amateur, there is a chance to impact more immediately that a five or six year timeframe.

“I believe I can win any week that I play. My game is good. It’s in good shape, it’s just a matter of accessing it really. To access your best is (about) preparation, doing all the right things and I’m doing all of that.

“So, now, it’s just a matter of momentum and confidence to go my way and that happens during a tournament. It happens sometimes unexpectedly or out of the blue . . . I’ve a bit of work to do on chipping and putting, that’s the spark of confidence I’m looking for.”

Rose has been grouped with Faldo for the opening two rounds, a reminder, if it were needed, of English failure in this championship since the golfing knight won three of them. Yesterday he was asked about this.

“In the years since Faldo, we’ve seen Irish players win it, Scottish players win it, but no Englishman. Do you have any theories?”

In response, Rose shook his head. “I don’t have any theories, and it should be the other way around if you look at the world rankings and what have you, because we’ve definitely had some strong contenders and world number ones and stuff like that. I really don’t know. No theory. Hopefully it’s about to turn.”

Maybe. Or maybe not.

What is undisputed is that Rose, as the world number eight, should have a good shot at changing that particular statistic.