Rory back for shot at Irish Open glory after spell away
RORY McIlroy will return to the Irish Open field this year after sitting out last season’s event.
The world number one’s place at Mount Juliet was confirmed yesterday afternoon by tournament host Graeme McDowell.
Due to the impact of the Olympic Games on the golfing calendar, this year’s event has been shifted from its normal July berth and will now take place from May 28 to 31.
McIlroy will be targeting a second win in Ireland’s flagship European Tour event, having also tasted success at the K Club in 2016.
The 30-year-old revealed it will be his first time playing on one of Ireland’s best parkland courses in Kilkenny.
“I’m looking forward to it a lot,” he said. “It’s a bit different going back for a May date as opposed to July, and at a parkland course at Mount Juliet. I’ve never played the course but I’ve good memories — it was the first time I ever watched Tiger Woods play in person.
“My dad drove me down and we watched the World Golf Championship there and that was really cool, so it’ll be exciting to tee it up there myself and try to win a tournament there.”
McIlroy was host of the Irish Open from 2015 to 2018 before it was announced that players would take it in turns to host the event. Portrush golfer McDowell will take on the role for both this year’s and next year’s events, with the 2021 edition set to return to Portstewart GC.
“I enjoyed hosting the event — it’s a privilege to host your national open,” said McIlroy.
“I would say to G-Mac, just try and prepare as best he can for the tournament and make sure he gets his work in before the week. You’ve got a lot going on, but I think everyone who hosts a tournament knows that.”
McIlroy missed last year’s Irish Open as he prioritised his preparation for the Open Championship at Royal Portrush, opting instead to play the week before his home major at the Scottish Open.
The decision caused some criticism but, with plenty of support, McIlroy defended his right to make special arrangements for the Open’s long-awaited return to Northern Ireland.
“I’m going to make decisions that are the best thing for me,” he said. “If that upsets anyone, then I’m sorry — that’s not my problem, that’s their problem.”
Mount Juliet hosted the Irish Open from 1993 to 1995, when Nick Faldo, Bernhard Langer and Sam Torrance lifted the trophy.
It twice hosted the WGC-American Express Championship, in 2002 and 2004, with Tiger Woods and Ernie Els coming out on top.
Early bird ticket prices begin at €13 for the Wednesday Pro-Am day, with Thursday and Friday day tickets available for a special price of €23 and Saturday and Sunday tickets beginning at €27. √Scotland’s Stephen Gallacher claimed a share of the halfway lead in the Oman Open as he seeks a third European Tour victory in the Middle East.
Gallacher, who won back-toback Dubai Desert Classic titles in 2013 and 2014, carded a bogey-free 67 at Al Mouj Golf Club to join Denmark’s Rasmus Hojgaard at the top of the leaderboard on nine under par.
Belgium’s Nicolas Colsaerts and Finland’s Kalle Samooja are a shot off the lead, with the English duo of Robert Rock and Richard McEvoy part of a five-strong group two strokes further back on six under.
WITH recent postponements leaving a raft of rugby players across the island feeling a little short of game time, a few supporters out there of a more traditional bent have been calling for a return of the old-school Probables v Possibles trials.
The idea of Irish frontliners going at each other hammer and tongs may well feel anachronistic now but it’s not so long ago that it was a central tenet of Irish team selection.
Indeed, it was one such game that Ulster legend Nigel Carr credits with changing the course of his career.
By 1984, the flanker was no stranger to the journey from Belfast to the Irish team’s base at the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin — where legend has it the Ulster contingent would, upon arrival, order a fillet steak with a prawn cocktail for both starter and dessert — but had yet to win his first Test cap.
Part of the backbone of Jimmy Davidson’s successful Ulster side — the same one that would famously beat the Wallabies — and having featured for the Probables, that seemed set to change. Until Mick Doyle named his team.
“I’d been in the Ireland teams since I was 19, playing in Under-23 games and ‘B’ internationals of which there were a lot more of at that time. I was as experienced an uncapped player as you could be,” recalled Carr.
“I’m not sure that I was always ambitious from the point of view of setting goals, looking to play for Ireland, thinking about playing for the Lions or that sort of thing.
“My ambition probably extended as far as trying to play the very best that I could in whatever game I was in. It was that international trial match when I was selected in the Probables and then didn’t make the team that gave me the kick up the backside to make sure I got everything I could out of it.”
Doyle would give him his debut in the first game of the 1985 Five Nations, alongside five