Young Scots pair suffer in closing stretch

Robert MacIntyre and Sandy Scott played together as in their amateur Scotland international days, but the US Open at Winged Foot made things a little different for the young Scots.

Scott is still an amateur in his final year at Texas Tech University, is playing in his first major championship and he was even featured on US TV coverage a couple of times as he got to one-under when he birdied the 11th.

However that was the high water mark for the 22-year-old from Nairn, as he had two sixes in the next three holes and three bogeys in the tough finishing stretch to finish with a 75.

“I got off to a good start, played the front nine nice and solid, hit plenty of fairways and greens, gave myself a few good looks,” he said.

“But I started to miss a few fairways coming in on the back nine and kind of gave myself too much work, really, was scrambling for pars and made some bogeys.

“There was certainly some good golf in there. I was just fractionally off line coming in on the back nine. I don’t think there’s much wrong, I’ll keep practice light this afternoon and be ready to go for tomorrow.”

Playing with MacIntyre helped him settle, he agreed.

“It was great, I’ve played with Robert plenty of times and it certainly made it more comfortable for me,” he said.

“It didn’t necessarily feel like I thought a US Open would, with no fans and stuff, it feels like it’s different.

“In your mind you know you’re playing with the same guys that would normally be playing, so it’s not a huge difference, but the first tee was a special feeling for sure.”

MacIntyre hit his approach at the first to within two feet for birdie, but dropped two at the short third and then battled to still be one-over coming to the final stretch. Three successive bogeys from the 15th broke the streak of pars, however, although he rallied for a par at the last and a four-over 74.