RORY RISING TO THE BAIT
McIlroy hits back at the Twitter insults. Now he must fire on the course
IF Rory McIlroy gets his career back on track this summer, it is unlikely Steve Elkington’s name will figure in any of his victory speeches. But perhaps it should.
Riled by some typically stupid comments from the thick-oaf Australian on Twitter, the Northern Irishman let the world know in his responses that he’s certainly up for the fight and has no intention of sitting on his hundreds of millions.
Remember what McIlroy was like at the Ryder Cup last year, the brilliant golf that flowed when he felt he was being goaded? Picking an argument with former USPGA champion Elkington will only help to get the juices flowing, as he embarks on a hectic run of six events over the next eight weeks.
Elkington (below) once possessed the sweetest swing in golf but he has one of the ugliest voices on social media. When 10 people died after a helicopter crashed into a Glasgow pub four years ago, this is the idiot who tweeted: ‘Locals report no beer was spilled.’
Then there was a racist barb we certainly don’t need to repeat here which he posted while playing in a Senior Open at Royal Birkdale. Normally, therefore, McIlroy wouldn’t give the likes of Elkington the time of day but here the intention was to clearly send out a defiant message.
When a high-profile golfer misses the cut in a major it’s the easiest jibe in the world to say they’ve become too comfortable.
So, naturally, the Elk stooped low after McIlroy missed out at the US Open on Friday: ‘Rory is so bored playing golf, without Tiger the threshold is prolly four majors with 100 mill in the bank.’
McIlroy shot back: ‘More like 200 mill, not bad for a “bored” 28-year-old, plenty more where that came from’, as he pointed out a lengthy list of his considerable achievements in 10 years as a pro.
Then it got personal and puerile. Elkington accused McIlroy of only being interested in money. The latter highlighted Elkington’s appalling grammar. Oh dear.
On to the more important battle and what McIlroy needs to do this summer to give Dustin Johnson a run for his money at the top of the world game.
First and foremost, he needs to get back to playing regularly — hence his busy upcoming schedule. The welldocumented rib problems that mean he has played only seven tournaments so far plainly account for his lack of momentum, although it should be pointed out he’s still had four top seven finishes and this was his first missed cut. He has also got married and put 14 new clubs in his bag, after signing a new deal with TaylorMade (it might be of interest to Elkington that, in fact, he rejected a far more lucrative offer from Callaway). All this easily explains why he turned up at a US Open course that would normally play to his strengths but could only deliver what’s known in the trade as ‘tight’ golf, where there is no fluidity in the swing. Even with four birdies in his last six holes, when he finally freed it up a little, he still missed the cut by four shots. Of more concern to McIlroy will be his overall record in the majors since he claimed two back to back in the summer of 2014.
The blunt truth is he hasn’t contended down the stretch in any and this was his third missed cut in the last five.
He should do something about that this summer, or else the alarm bells really will start to chime.
The Open next month is back in the north-west of England, where he won three years ago. And the USPGA in August is being held on a Quail Hollow course in North Carolina which was the scene of his first PGA Tour victory and where he has won twice.
No wonder, therefore, McIIroy was not too downhearted as he left Wisconsin on Friday night. Restored to near-full health for the first time all year, he always produces his best golf when he feels like he has something to prove andhe’s clearly looking forward to the challenge.
Come the back end of August, we might just have cause to look back and thank the hapless Elkington.
McIlroy, mind, isn’t the only big name watching the final round today on television. Indeed, there has never have been a Grand Slam event staged where so many of the elite missed the cut.
This is the first time since the world rankings were devised in 1986 that the top three ranked players — defending champion Johnson, McIlroy and Jason Day — all missed the cut in a major.
They were joined by the likes of Open champion Henrik Stenson, Olympic gold medallist Justin Rose and Europe’s two young hotshots, Jon Rahm and Thomas Pieters.
Each of the past six majors has been won by a first-timer and here we had a leaderboard at halfway where the top 19 players didn’t have a Grand Slam title between them.
Among that group were two Englishmen, Paul Casey and Tommy Fleetwood, who were part of a four-way tie at the top with Americans Brian Harman and Brooks Koepka.
The pair went into the weekend with contrasting goals. For 26-yearold Fleetwood, the experience will only be a useful learning one whatever happens, given this is only his second US Open.
For 39-year-old Casey, however, this is the sort of golden opportunity that rarely comes along at his age in the quest to attain the cherished status of major champion.
In touch were two players upholding the honour of the world’s top 10 who will surely win majors at some point — No9 Rickie Fowler was just one back with No4 Hideki Matsuyama two adrift.
Lurking in tied 20th place but just four behind was one proven major winner — Sergio Garcia.
He was seeking two in a row, of course, following his stirring success at the Masters.