The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Rory’s unnecessary agenda
As we noted last week, the European Tour’s flagship finish, the DP World (pause) Championship, took a knock with Justin Rose and Paul Casey’s nonappearance.
At least by not being present they couldn’t diminish the event even further. On arriving at Jumeriah Estates (a former sponsor), step forward Rory Mcilroy, Europe’s flagship player, to demean the Tour even more.
Rory told the gathered throng that he might not fulfil the minimum tournament requirement for membership next year and will probably relinquish it, before going on to basically call his home tour a second division.
He currently only has two events pencilled in next year – oddly, one of which appears to be the Scottish Open at Renaissance and not the Irish Open the week previous, an event he largely saved and has been a named sponsor for the last four years. You need a mere four (outside of majors and WGC events) to qualify for membership.
But why the confrontation? Rory could easily slip in a couple of events in the radically redrawn schedule after the PGA Tour ends and the Fedex Cup is done – maybe Wentworth, maybe the Dunhill, certainly one or more of the season-ending Rolex Series events. Why give up membership altogether?
There has to be another agenda at play here, because there’s no good reason for this, especially since the new rule that any player who relinquishes tour membership even for a season disqualifies themselves from the Ryder Cup captaincy in future.
(Brief digression: This is a daft rule, and has no chance of surviving the two decades before Rory is even considered for the job.)
Is Mcilroy not happy with Keith Pelley, the tour’s chief executive, or is he flexing his muscles as the tour’s top draw?
If it’s the latter, one can understand his need to make a stand so far ahead of time, for if he continues to play the way he’s been playing the last two seasons he’s not going to be the tour’s top draw anyway for much longer.
Despite all that, a decent DPWC
If Tommy Fleetwood had done the implausible and won the tour finale, thereby retaining the Race to Dubai, the groundswell for him now being Europe’s top draw would have been significant.
He didn’t, and Francesco Molinari tied up the year’s title. Despite some strange suggestions, there is no other contender remotely close for Player of the Year honours on this side of the Atlantic, and only Brooks Koepka is a rival in the world of golf as a whole.
As for the DPWC title itself, we got a great story in Danny Willett’s cathartic victory, his first since his Masters win.
There are some who won’t be convinced Willett is no more than a one-hit wonder until he wins another major, but in truth he has rejoined Fleetwood, Justin Rose and now Matt Wallace – who got close to his fourth win of the season – at the head of an English wave who will threaten to win somewhere in the world most weeks of the season.
In the last 11 weeks of the European Tour season there were seven different English winners. And had Tyrrell Hatton hung on at the Dunhill, it would have been eight.
It’d be great if we could get some Scots on the podium in 2019, and there is certainly greater scope for it with 11 having qualified for next year.
Marc Warren’s escape at Tour School was a relief, and he’ll do a bit better than the usual Q School grad in terms of playing chances because of his track record.
Only, a player of his quality should have been nowhere near that ordeal, and next season we have to see more Scots in the top 60 than simply occasional visitor Russell Knox.
“If he continues to play the way he has for the last couple of seasons he’s not going to be the tour’s top draw anyway
The Match unworthy of the name
I was trying to imagine a more representative contest of golf in the late second decade of the 21st Century than the over-hyped, artificial clash between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson in Las Vegas this week.
Perhaps a play-off of the top four in the world rankings, maybe? Or being more specific, how about Brooks Koepka and the new big-hitting flavour Cameron Champ taking turns bashing it down an airport runway?
Sorry, we’re stuck with a contest that, as Rory Mcilroy suggested somewhat snootily, might have been interesting 19 years ago.
Then, at least, there was some quality antipathy between the two and it might well have been a proper grudge match.
Instead, what we have now is business partners (they’ve set up a joint shell company to handle all the mutual millions) trying to establish a format ostensibly designed to capitalise on liberalised gambling regulations.
Tiger and Phil will own this new series of high-stake challenge matches – involving them and, they no doubt hope, players with considerably longer-term shelf-lives in the elite game – thereby retaining an importance in the game way beyond their competitive effectiveness.
Why bother slogging on the Champions Tour when you’re in control of these one-round beanfeasts?
Smart plan. But to me, a huge yawn.