BEWARE THE STARS AND STRIPES
The most formidable collection of players to cross the Atlantic…so it’s odds-on an American winner
the most significant major in a generation will begin today at the home of a sport standing at a crossroads. But for four days, we can look forward to everything good about the Royal and Ancient game.
From the awe and grandeur of the setting to a challenge that is going to require prodigious feats of skill and imagination, the 150th Open promises to live up to its stature.
But one wrong turn from Monday, leading to a further descent into the arms of greed, and who knows what state the game will be in come the next major at Augusta National eight long months from now?
Let’s park that thought, however, where it deserves to be — at the back of the mind.
Let’s concentrate on the good of golf and 72 holes that will be played under largely blue, blessed skies.
Prepare for some sumptuous television shots of glorious St Andrews Bay, where only the sight of the R&A clubhouse in the distance gives any hint of what is taking place amid crumpled acres on the other side of the dunes.
There is no question who will be the focus of attention today. Simply increasing the anticipation is the fact that the action will be almost nine hours old by the time he makes it to the first tee. The older he gets and more banged-up he looks, the more it means to have 46-yearold Tiger Woods in the field.
We know the window is now short for the 15-time major champion who played the game better than it has ever been played, including here at St Andrews in 2000 when he struck the ball so purely he avoided all 112 bunkers for all four days.
What a thrill to hear him stand up for golf in his press conference on Tuesday, when he denounced the greedy defectors propping up the disastrous Saudi LIV project. he remains the most important, authoritative voice of all.
Woods has played 58 holes in the build-up to this Open and if he can walk well enough for another four rounds — a huge if, admittedly — then expect him to surprise one or two of those who think he is here primarily for his picture walking across the Swilcan Burn.
This is the weather and the set-up that is simply perfect for the master strategist. Remember that near-flawless exhibition he gave on the similarly burnished fairways at hoylake in 2006, when he took the bunkers out of play striking one clinical iron after another from the tee?
In practice this week, we have seen enough to know he can still play. his swing might actually be better now than in his prime. The only question is whether he can walk the walk.
Whatever happens to Matt Fitzpatrick walking alongside him, befitting his new status as the US Open champion, he is going to get an invaluable demonstration of links golf that will be enormously beneficial.
Mind you, the 27-year-old from Sheffield has been playing so well for so long now it will be a surprise if he falters. he should relish this challenge.
By the time Woods gets on to the course shortly before 3pm, Rory McIlroy will have signed for his first-round scorecard. We will know whether his quest has been sabotaged by demons or passed a notable test.
McIlroy was always one of the more popular players but his strident campaign against LIV, turning down over £500million from the Saudis, is the stuff of which statues are built.
It was here in 2015 that it all started to go wrong for him in the majors, though, as he sat out his title defence owing to a freak ankle injury sustained playing football. What a story it would be if it was here where it all started to go right again.
The odds, however, favour an American winner. Seven of the last ten Opens at St Andrews have been won by players from the land of the stars and stripes.
This time, they travel with arguably the most formidable collection yet of players to cross the Atlantic. eight of the top 13 golfers in the world are American and, remarkably, all of them are aged 30 or under. The Old Course is supposed to favour experience but then so did Royal St George’s last year and that Open was won by Collin Morikawa, then aged 24 and making his debut.
The man spearheading their challenge this time is last year’s Open runner-up, Jordan Spieth, returning to the course where his hopes of winning a third Grand Slam title in a row in 2015 faltered when he got to the penultimate hole on Sunday and failed to convert a six-foot putt.
Back then, it was a shock to see him miss. he never missed. But short-putting has become the bane of his life, which might prove a problem on these enormous, largely double greens where every player will find himself facing plenty from that sort of range.
As for the home challenge, will Fitzpatrick’s splendid victory at Brookline prove a spark or an anomaly? In the 30 years since Sir Nick Faldo claimed the last of his three Claret Jugs — all of which came in Scotland, including here in 1990 — there have been five winners from Great Britain and Ireland; Paul Lawrie, Padraig harrington, Darren Clarke, McIlroy and Shane Lowry.
As ever with this event, it truly is open. A greater contrast with the monopoly of the big three in tennis would be hard to imagine. The last 13 editions have been won by 13 different players. None, however, had the importance of this one.
‘everything has led to this’ reads the R&A’s evocative strapline. Let’s hope the 150th delivers one for the ages and leads the game down the road to sanity.