Next time I face Tiger I’ll bury him
RUSSELL KNOX reckons he’ll bury Tiger Woods next time they play now he’s got the awe factor out of his system.
The Scot missed the cut but unlike his opening round he refused to blame the presence of his boyhood hero for putting him off his game.
The pair might yet meet up again on the first tee when the Ryder Cup starts in September.
And after his second consecutive round of 73 left him too far back on four over, Knox said: “I didn’t feel anything like that today, I was over it. “Tiger, who’s that? “You’re only going to get to play the first time with him once and that was mine.
“So I think it was important to get it out of the way and next time I’ll bury him.
“The conditions were so difficult starting out today in the rain.
“You’re just trying to put one foot in front of the other so there was no time to think, ‘Oh, I’m playing with Tiger.’ I battled as hard as I could but I was useless.”
Woods claims he didn’t put the Carnoustie crowd in danger when he aimed directly at them to hook a tough shot from the rough over their heads.
Shocked TV viewers were alarmed as the shot appeared to clip off something as it struggled to clear the nearby crowd. In the end the ball landed short of the green and Woods went on to complete another round of 71 to stay level. He said: “I kept moving them back. If you noticed, I moved them back about 40 yards.
“I played a little bit better yesterday. Today wasn’t quite as good but I finally birdied a par five so that’s a positive. I could have cleaned up the round just a little bit.
“It will be a pretty packed leaderboard for the weekend and I’m certainly right there in it.”