Carnoustie set up to tempt the big hitters

Long drivers could be lured into danger areas Mickelson sees ‘different course’ to previous years

Boom or plot, lay it up or blast over. The 147th Open Championship is presenting dilemmas to the competitors which could well make this one of the more intriguing and varied first rounds in recent major history.

Believe it, this will be about as far removed from the target golf of the American country clubs as can blessedly be imagined. Cast aside the old dartboard analogy and think of the skittle alley. Carnoustie is burnt – not as burnt as Royal Birkdale in 1976, when a discarded cigarette caused a fire in the bonedry hay and play to be suspended for 30 minutes as smoke billowed across the course – but toasty brown, nonetheless.

For the past four days of practice, the conditions have caused havoc with the game plans. The players arrived in Angus expecting to follow the traditional Carnoustie tactic sheet of staying out of the rough, the bunkers and the burns.

But the conditions are so fast and firm and, more to the point, the rough is so wispy, that many of them are thinking again.

And they will still be thinking, all the way up to their tee-times. Phil Mickelson summed up the quandary.

“I’m used to the thick, heavy rough we got in 1999 and 2007, but this is a totally different golf course,” he said. “Even though it’s still difficult to control the ball out of this rough because you can get flyers, it is not that ‘wedge, hack it back out into the middle fairway’ rough. So, there are a lot of holes where you can hit drivers and sometimes that is the play.

“Conversely, the ground is so firm that you can get around with four or five-irons. I think you’re going to see two different strategies from players. Mine will be somewhere in the middle.”

The bunkers can be avoided by brute force and then the point is: would you rather play out of just about manageable rough say, 90 yards from the green, or from 220 yards in the middle of the fairway?

Naturally, some of the big-hitters, such as world No 1 Dustin Johnson and US Open champion Brooks Koepka, will be tempted to give it the big heave-ho and to hell with the “oh, no”.

A personal suspicion is that both can overpower this Carnoustie course, but Shane Lowry, a canny links campaigner who is absurd odds at 150-1, warns it could turn into a dust bowl of the vanities.

“I think people have a misconception of how this course is going to play,” he said. “It’s going to play a lot harder than people are seeing in practice. The greens are going to dry out and it’s going to be like a runway out there.

“If you get the ball off line, you’re going to get yourself in trouble. The guys who want to hit drivers everywhere, let them go ahead and if I’m wrong I’ll obviously eat my words. But I just don’t think it’s driver everywhere. You need to get the ball in play, on the short grass and have control with your iron shots then.”

Tiger Woods seems to concur. He told his friend Notah Begay that he intends to hit “none to four drivers” in the entire week. That inevitably evokes the memories of Hoylake in 2006 when, as everyone else was trying to bring that parched Wirral land to its knees, he brought them all to theirs with a conservative master plan that was stunning both in its discipline and its execution.

As he eyes his first major in 10 years and his first win of any description in five years, Woods is plainly up for this and it is easy to believe that this test could represent his best shout. If he does falter and crash out, the questions will be fair.

But then, he may have the draw to blame and those going out in the afternoon today have been making nervous glances at the forecast. A calm beginning is predicted to give way to stronger breezes, which could gust up past 20mph. And the bad news for the second wave is that these winds could hang around until tomorrow lunchtime – for their second rounds.

If that comes to pass, then Justin Rose will believe he has finally won the lottery, after so many unlucky draws. A relatively early bird at 9.58am in the company of defending champion Jordan Spieth, Rose can set out his stall as the Englishman most likely to end the nation’s barren Open run of 26 years and, indeed, the non-american most likely to end the US streak of five consecutive majors.

Rory Mcilroy will, of course, be another the galleries will look to, but he starts after lunch and the fear is he will be too aggressive. What an opening we have in store.

James Corrigan’s prediction

Dustin Johnson Has the game for Carnoustie and could overpower the links. Despite being world No1, he is somehow coming under the radar.