GOLF:Rory McIlroy showed character in facing the media after Sunday's major collapse, writes
PHILIP REIDin Augusta
THE HARDEST part is to pick up the pieces, to figure out why it all went wrong and how to safeguard against future recurrences. That’s the tough part. And, for Rory McIlroy, who became the fall-guy in a nightmarish but nevertheless compelling drama which unfurled on the manicured course at Augusta National Golf Club on Sunday, with South African Charl Schwartzel claiming the US Masters title, the rebuilding process is unlikely to be a rushed one.
Why hurry?
Indeed, it said much about McIlroy’s character in the aftermath of the final round disintegration that he didn’t sneak away afterwards. That would have been an easy thing to do. Instead, he stood to face the music, his head obviously swirling with thoughts, and he used the post-round series of interviews with print, radio and television media as a first step on a therapeutic recovery.
As Greg Norman, who in 1996 suffered the most infamous collapse of all in this tournament that every golfer wants above any other, admitted after witnessing the Irishman’s meltdown: “I know exactly how he felt. What is it with golf destiny? Isn’t it strange? It taps you on the back of your head and it either pushes you ahead or it pushes you back. Who determines that? It’s crazy.”
McIlroy, who plays in this week’s Malaysian Open, will return from the Far East for a two-week break, before returning to action in defending his Wells Fargo Championship title at Quail Hollow on the US Tour and then diving into the meat of the season that takes in the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth among other events in the run-up to the US Open at Congressional.
A meeting with his manager, Andrew “Chubby” Chandler, is on the agenda for when he returns from Malayasia.
Interestingly, though, his manager – a former player himself on the European Tour – made this observation on Sunday night: “The problem with Rory is that he doesn’t play a lot, so you don’t get that much practice at winning. And that’s the balance, how many times you play . . . you have to stay fresh and focused and, it was great, he came in fresh as a daisy. But you’ve got to learn to do certain things around a golf course.”
Hmmm.
No doubt about it, McIlroy – given his talent and his work ethic – will be back. In fact, Graeme McDowell, a close friend and the reigning US Open champion, made a point of phoning his fellow-Northern Irishman shortly afterwards to provide encouragement, while Nick Faldo, the man who was on the other side of things in benefiting from Norman’s collapse in 1996, offered these words: “He’s young and I am sure he will regroup and come back stronger. He was thrown in at the deep end and this is a serious deep end. You are there on your own, and things get out of sync and you lose your tempo.”
McIlroy will have to reflect on, to use an Americanism, a zany 45 minutes of golf which started on the 10th hole – where he hit one tree with his drive and later another with his greenside recovery – en route to a triple bogey and continued on into Amen Corner where he three-putted the 11th and four-putted the 12th before putting his drive on the 13th into Rae’s Creek.
Unbelievable, grotesque and bizarre to watch; but, on this course, far from unprecedented.
The catalyst for it all going wrong was probably that tee-shot on the 10th.
“I don’t think anyone has been over there in those cabins before,” McIlroy acknowledged of a shot which ricocheted off the tree’s trunk and came to rest between two cabins, known as Peek and Berckmans, which hardly any of us on the course knew existed. “It’s going to take a few days, but I’ll get over it.”
What would he learn?
“It’s the Sunday of a Major, (shows) what it can do. This is my first experience of (leading), and hopefully the next time I’m in this position I’ll be able to handle it a little better. I didn’t handle it particularly well. But it was a character-building day, and I’ll come out stronger for it,” said McIlroy.
If he were to look for parallel experiences, McIlroy might do worse, when he gets the opportunity, than to have a word with Canadian Mike Weir. In the final round of the 1999 US PGA Championship at Medinah, Weir finished with an 80.
Four years later, he had a Green Jacket as the 2003 Masters champion placed on to this shoulders. “I took a lot of positives out of that day,” Weir would remark of his travails in that final round.
Who knows for sure what mental scars McIlroy must deal with as he seeks to get over the fallout from Sunday’s final round? But he has so much going for him: he is only 21, but already has three third place finishes in the Majors. And, as his manager observed in providing some perspective, “it’s not a train smash . . . he’s 21.”
His time will surely come again.
SCHWARTZEL BACKS McILROY TO WIN A MAJOR
LIFE DOESN’T stop, not for golf’s newest Major champion nor, indeed, for the man who started the final round as the one most likely. Yesterday, Charl Schwartzel – the latest South African to don the green jacket in succession to Trevor Immelman and Gary Player – moved on to his next golfing engagement and, in some sort of ironic twist of fate, he was due to share a plane with Rory McIlroy on their way via Dubai to the Malaysian Open, writes Philip Reid.
Even in victory, Schwartzel – an ISM agency stable mate of McIlroy’s – allowed his thoughts to drift towards the Ulsterman. “What do you say? He is such a good player. He’s going to win a Major sometime . . . the way he played the first three rounds, you have to think a win is not that far away. Golf is a funny game. One moment you’re on top of it, and the next it bites you. He’s such a phenomenal player, he’ll win one . . . he’s a good enough player to come back out and win,” he said.
Schwartzel, who became the first player in Masters history to birdie all four of the closing holes on his way to winning, claimed Louis Oosthuizen’s win in last year’s British Open provided the inspiration for him. “We play almost every single practice round together. We know where our level of golf is, and just to see him do it made it, in my mind, realise it is possible, and maybe take it over the barrier of thinking that a major is too big for someone to win.”
