RORY MEETS HIS MATCH IN TEXAS
FOR 10 holes yesterday, Rory McIlroy suffered such a rude awakening following his heroics at the Arnold Palmer Invitational on Sunday it was positively obscene. An opening group assignment in the WGC-Dell Match Play Championship against former US Amateur champion Peter Uihlein always looked a tricky assignment for a
man still on cloud nine.
No one could have guessed, however, he would fall to earth at such a clattering rate, as he found himself a pulverising five down.
How typical of this sport that a golfer who couldn’t miss on the greens on Sunday couldn’t buy a putt three days later. Eight birdies one day turned into none over the first 11 holes 72 hours later. Throw in a couple of unforced errors, and the match was effectively over before the back nine had barely begun.
Then Rory woke up. From the 12th he reeled off five birdies in-arow, with a series of shots that recalled some of the magnificent blows he struck on Sunday.
Five down with five to play, he holed a 40-foot putt at the 14th to stay alive. At the 15th, he holed from eight feet.
At the par-five 16th, he was so pumped up his three wood second shot travelled through the green into a bunker. Another great sand shot to four feet and now he was two down. The match ended on the par three 17th, as the birdie run came to an end — but it was some way to go down.
It means McIlroy will go into his second group match against Jhonattan Vegas today needing to defy Vegas odds to make it through to the weekend.
In the all-England battle, the ‘match play ninja’ Ian Poulter was a long way from his warrior-like best — but then he didn’t need to be. Up against an out-of-sorts Tommy Fleetwood in his first group game, the 42-year-old upset the odds to get a week that could do so much for his career off to the perfect start.
It was one of the locals who came up with the ninja nickname for Poulter, and the flamboyant one added his own twist by dusting down his equivalent of the Samurai sword — the putter he wielded to such deadly affect at the Ryder Cup at Medinah in 2012 — for its first public appearance in five years. He even had a deep pink shirt on as he did on that unforgettable Saturday in Chicago when he changed everything by holing five birdie putts in a row to win his fourball match alongside McIlroy.
There the comparisons should end. If Poulter had putted back then like he did yesterday, the Americans would have completed the Medinah massacre, not fallen victim to a miracle. Such was the nature of the game, if it had been strokeplay the pair would have been way down the leaderboard. Yet, as Poulter said: ‘That’s the beauty of match play. The only thing that matters is winning your match.’
Elsewhere, Justin Thomas was earlier made to work hard for victory against Luke List, despite his opponent giving himself a selfinflicted handicap.
List was forced to putt with his sand wedge after bending his putter out of shape in frustration during the early stages of the Group Two contest.
But the world number 67, who lost out to Thomas in a play-off for the Honda Classic last month, battled back from three down with four to play to take the tie all the way to the 18th before Thomas completed just his second victory in seven matches in the event.
Thomas, who can become world No1 with a victory this week, admitted the thought of an embarrassing defeat had crossed his mind: ‘I was thinking how bad that would hurt if I couldn’t get it done. I don’t know what happened (with List’s putter) but I knew that it would hopefully make it easier on me. But it didn’t.’