Scott backed to recover
AUSTRALIAN golfing great Jack Newton has backed Adam Scott to rediscover his major-winning form, suspecting the former world No.1 has put family ahead of his career.
Scott, the 2013 US Masters champion, ended the season ranked 31st after missing the cut at the Australian PGA this month.
The Gold Coast father of two failed to add to his 13 career US PGA Tour victories in 16 attempts this year, finishing in the top 10 four times.
Newton believes his compa- triot’s decline is likely linked to having other life priorities.
“I’m not sure about that,” Newton said when asked if Scott was past his best.
“I think he’s got married, he’s got a kid now and all that sort of stuff can get in the road of what he would have done as an individual.
“His putting’s always been suspect in my book. I just don’t think he’s a good reader of the greens. But he’s got one of the best golf swings in the game, there’s no doubt about that.”
Scott’s unease with putting was apparent when he reverted to the broomstick at the Australian PGA on the Gold Coast for the first time since an anchoring ban was introduced nearly two years ago.
It served him well during the first round but he missed the cut despite heading into the second day at one-under.
Newton, a two-time major runner-up in the 1970s and 80s who’s famous for his efforts training junior talent, recounted a 2011 confrontation with Scott over his work around the greens and the impact it was having on his game.
“At a press conference in Melbourne once, I shot up and asked him what the problem was with reading the greens,” Newton said at the annual charity pro-am he hosts in the Hunter Valley.
“I said you might need glasses. Well, he got the s ..... when I said that.
“I went up to him after it and I said, ‘Mate, I wasn’t having a go at you. I’m just talking about what I’ve observed’. When he won the Masters, he was going to hit that put right lip. And (caddie) Steve Williams said no, it’s a cup-and-ahalf right.
“So if he’d have gone where he wanted to hit it, it would have missed on the bottom side and he wouldn’t have won the tournament.”