... BUT RORY JUST MISSES CUT AFTER VALIANT 65
THE OPEN PORTRUSH
AFTER the choke came the roar. Unfortunately for Rory McIlroy, it wasn’t quite loud enough to change the outcome of this sorry and soggy trip home.
But what a stunning effort and what a remarkable pursuit of that dotted cut line, which was out of sight at 3.10pm yet almost under foot five hours later. Almost.
That he got so close was down to the kind of golf that is off limits to all bar a handful of the world’s best golfers, with seven birdies, one bogey and a tally of 65 that was jointly the best of the day.
It really was superb, a thrilling chase that got far closer than anyone could have imagined, but there is only so much one can do from eight-over. By reining that in to two-over for 36 holes, the local lad missed the cut by one.
And so, while this comeback was stirring, it will not alter a narrative about McIlroy’s psychological frailties that started in 2011 at the Masters and came thundering back into the discussion after the first round.
The Golf Channel analyst and former PGA pro Brandel Chamblee had put the strongest interpretation on the situation on Thursday night by labelling it as a ‘choke’. An inflammatory word, that. But it wasn’t necessarily wrong when you assess the wider performancence of an 8- 1 favourite who once battered this course for 61 as a 16-year-old.
The man often speaks fondly of that boy, of his fearlessness and confidence, and McIlroy has never looked more weathered than he did d during that loop op of 79.
At least this second econd round polished thehe score, even if it didn’t settle it, not that we needed reminding that McIlroy is an exceptional talent. The problem is expectation. On Thursday, it was there. Yesterday, it was not. And we saw vastly different results in that limited sample, just as we hhave seen it so ofteoften in the broader dadata since his lai last major triumph in 2014. Whether he ever gets back to that level remains to bbe seen. For now, hhe is stuck on four wwith a head full of reregrets and mixed feefeelings. By the time he was done, he was close to tears as hhe said: ‘It’s going to hurt for a while. Sorry, I’m a bit emotional. The crowd played their part. I didn’t play mine.’ He added: ‘I didn’t know how people were going to react after the first round, how many people were going to be on the first tee. Is it just a lost cause?
‘But to have that many people out there following me, supporting me, cheering my name, it meant the world to me.
‘I felt today I at least showed the real Rory McIlroy and the golf that I can play. I am unbelievably proud of how I handled myself coming back after what was a very challenging day.’
He explained last night how he had picked himself up after the first round with a bottle of wine and a couple of episodes of the American drama, The Sinner. As a formula, it worked.
He made inroads with birdies at three and seven, but he will wonder about the putting that cost him on the front nine. He missed a 15-footer for birdie on four, lipped a short one after driving all the way to the fringe on five and got nothing from the vulnerable sixth. Makeable putts also came and went at eight and nine, leaving him six over.
He was behind the run rate as he hit the turn but then, from nowhere, he birdied the next three. For the first time in two rounds, he had some of his old swagger. Fantastic, riveting stuff.
He had a stumble with a bogey at 13, but was on his feet again at the next. A holed birdie putt from 10 feet on the 14th — one of only seven all day on a hole that was statistically the toughest for the field — had him back in the game and a birdie at 16 put him on the brink. He needed one more and he didn’t get it. Closer than anyone expected; not close enough.