South African Darren Fichardt and Australian Jarrod Moseley share the first round lead of the Smurfit European Open at the K-Club in Kildare, but the performance of Ashbourne club professional John Dwyer proved the silver lining on an wet, overcast and weather-beaten first day, not least for the bulk of the Irish contingent.
Most impressive was observing how Dwyer managed to hold together his round in the worst of the poor conditions which the last group of the day were forced to endure for most of their round. The 28-year-old, who plays on the Irish PGA circuit and is the reigning Ulster Open Champion and reigning Irish PGA Order of Merit winner - a title that ensured qualification for this event - carded a three-under 69 to spearhead the 13-strong Irish challenge.
"It’s a great start, I played well in the conditions by hitting a lot of greens and not doing anything too silly," said the brother of former champion jockey Mark Dwyer, a two-time Gold Cup winner (Jodami in 1993, Forgive’n’Forget in 1985).
"This is my seventh European and Irish Open (in total) and it’s days like this that make you think of going for your card again, said Dwyer after blazing the back nine, his front, in three-under 34 before finishing the job with a level par front side. "I am a bit of a home-bird though and I enjoy playing the Irish circuit and managing the shop and doing the odd lesson," he said.
This season on the Irish circuit Dwyer has been no stranger to lifting cheques, albeit for a fraction of the €515,585 first prize which is on offer here this week. Having finished runner-up to Paul McGinley in the Irish PGA Championship at Westport in April, he followed with a win in the Foxrock Ladies’ pro-am. Other notable finishes include a tied second at the Irish Club Professionals’ Championship and tied third in the Southern Championship.
South African Fichardt, who was one of the play-off losers at last week’s Irish Open, carded a five-under 67 to make it a surprise southern hemisphere one-two with Moseley (considering the appalling wet Irish afternoon conditions), one shot ahead of the day’s early leader Argentina’s Jorge Berendt and New Zealander Michael Campbell and Sweden’s Jaokim Haeggman on four-under.
"The sooner I got back up on the horse the better," was Fichardt’s response after taking advice from established names such as Retief Goosen and Mark McNulty. "I spoke to Retief on the range today and that helped me regroup and start all over again."
Moseley recognises he is a better player now since his maiden win at the Heineken Classic in 1999. "I’m a much better player mentally and am now capable of shooting the low scores. I’m not getting ahead of myself but it feels good being able to give myself chances like I did out there today," he said.
Padraig Harrington and Gary Murphy were the next best of the Irish on level par and while Harrington felt he missed an opportunity to score better, the elements certainly worked in his favour.
"I’m a little disappointed with my round because it was a perfect day for scoring," said Harrington unaware of how much the day would change from his calm morning conditions.
The defending champion Darren Clarke was clearly frustrated with his lack of progress and had to settle for a two-over par 74, the same score as Philip Walton. Clarke is not renowned for hanging about and expressing his thoughts freely with the attentive media. Today was no different. "I putted badly and scored badly," was his limited response.
Sympathy must go to Paul McGinley, who opted to miss last week’s Irish Open, ‘a decision not taken lightly’, to recover from mental exhaustion and a loss of form. After a two week break he returned feeling refreshed only to shoot 77 on the course where he is the touring professional.
"This is not me, I don’t play this standard of golf and I find it really surprising," he said after a round which started and finished with disaster and a purple patch in between. Wayward driving cost him an opening double-bogey and bogey and two more doubles and a bogey in the last five put paid to any notions of recovery. A shame because he had made four birdies to get back to one-under with five holes to play.
"My confidence is undermined at the moment because of shots that come out of nowhere but I’m not going to hide away from this, I’ll stay and face it by playing in tournaments and get my confidence back that way," was his defiant conclusion on a day better off forgotten.
>- Des Smyth
9 over
3 under- John Dwyer
Level- Padraig Harrington, Gary Murphy
2 over- Philip Walton, Darren Clarke
3 over- Michael Hoey, Eamonn Darcy, Graeme McDowell
4 over- John Dignam
5 over- Paul McGinley
6 over- Ronan Rafferty
7 over -David Walker