Dechambeau off to a ‘hot start’ at
◆ LIV player who once said course was too easy sets pace with a 65 ◆ Fit-again former winner Willett also looking good after solid 68
Dechambeau let his clubs do the talking at Augusta National for the first time since opening his big mouth and claiming the par for him here was 67. On that basis, the American opened with a two-under effort in the 88th Masters but, in actual fact of course, a 65 represented a splendid seven-under-par opening salvo.
His claim about the Georgia venue effectively being too easy for him came after he’d opened with a 66 in 2019 then returned the following year for a November assignment during the Covid pandemic as the US Open champion after landing a major breakthrough at Winged Foot a couple of months earlier. Since making his outrageous remark, he’d only matched his self-professed number once in 12 rounds and the actual one only three times.
Now one of LIV Golf’s star signings, Dechambeau had missed the cut on his last two trips up Magnolia Lane – he slumped to an 80 in the second round two years ago – but this was more like it from the 30-year-old. After a delay of two-and-a-half hours due to worries about an Armagedbryson don that didn’t materialise as the worst of Mother Nature’s medicine moved through to the south of the Georgia venue, he signed for an impressive eight birdies, including three to start his round and a second hat-trick from the 15th. His sole blemish was a bogey at the ninth.
A day after LIV Golf’s CEO and commissioner Greg Norman had been at Augusta National as a patron and claiming that “hundreds of people, even security guards” had been congratulating him for setting up the Saudi-backed breakaway circuit, it was exactly what the former world No 1 would have been hoping for after Brooks Koepka had done likewise 12 months ago in the opening exchange of the season between the LIV legion – 13 are in the field on this occasion – and players from the traditional tours.
“Well, it is always great getting off to a hot start with three birdies,” said Dechambeau, the low amateur here eight years ago. “To contend in major championships, especially here, you have to do everything well. Winning at Winged foot helped me understand how to win big tournaments, but I am trying to be a little smarter.”
Equally pleased, and rightly so, with his day’s work was Danny Willett as he signed for a 68, recording the first birdie of this year’s event at the opening hole then picking up three shots in the last four holes. Yes, he’s a winner around here, having become just the second Englishman to claim a Green Jacket after capitalising on Jordan Spieth’s 12th-hole slip up in the final round in 2016. This eye-catching effort, though, came in his first outing in six months after undergoing surgery on his left shoulder following the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth in September.
“It's unexpected, isn't it?” said a smiling Willett afterwards. “No, practice has been good. It was never an issue of whether or not the shoulder was strong enough, it was whether or not I could hit the shots I wanted to. I had no idea what to expect, so it's obviously always nice to come in having shot a decent score, and just give yourself that little bit of confidence inside and hopefully have a nice few more days.”
The doctors told the Yorkshireman that he would probably be out for 12-18 months, but, surprising himself as well as them, he’s made it here and, remarkably, showing little sign of rust. “It was something that needed doing," said Willett of needing to go under the knife. “Week in, week out, it was painful, and you're training so much just to try and get it into a place where you can think you can be able to move and swing a golf club all week, but ultimately, when the doctors went into the shoulder, it was worse than what we thought. In the end it's a good decision, and mentally I've come around to the fact that it needed doing, and I needed to do it now. The doctors said it would take 12 to 18 months, and we're just over six. I don't think any of them really would have given me a sniff of playing this week.”
Willett, who has slipped to 260th in the Official World Golf Ranking, spent six weeks in a 90-degree cast that he could only take off to shower and then underwent an extensive daily rehab routine that included ice baths, saunas
To contend in major championships, especially here, you have to do everything well