Early exit for Rory
Paul roars back after he cards an EIGHT
Former champion McIlroy slumped to five over par last night and has missed the cut at the US Open for the second straight year
IF EVER a round could be said to sum up a rollercoaster career it was surely the extraordinary 18 holes Paul Casey compiled on the second day of what is turning into a beguiling and totally unpredictable 117th US Open.
The Englishman looked dead and buried after following his brilliant first-round 66 with a dreaded snowman — a triple bogey eight — at his fifth hole, the 14th on the card. But the snowman did not melt. Perhaps drawing on the times when he fell from third in the world to outside the top 150, the 39-year-old summoned an astonishing riposte with five birdies in a row at one point.
From one shot off the lead at the start to outside the top 20 and seemingly in freefall, he finished right where he needs to be going into the weekend. That is Casey’s career in a nutshell.
When he had eventually added up all the extravagant numbers, the Surrey man discovered he had shot 71 to establish the clubhouse lead on seven under, two ahead of Si Woo Kim, the Korean who won the Players Championship last month. First-round leader Rickie Fowler, also on seven under, was among the later starters.
Sergio Garcia, who finally opened his majors account at the 74th attempt at the Masters, is in position to win another after adding a second-round 71 to his opening score of 70. At three under, he is just four behind. One shot closer are American Brendan Steele and dangerous Australian Marc Leishman, who won the Arnold Palmer Invitational in March and lost a play-off for The Open at St Andrews two years ago.
Casey was rightly ‘ecstatic’ on Thursday night after his six under par round and started in similar vein yesterday with a birdie at the 11th. But his first bogey of the event at the 12th heralded a horrific run of five dropped shots in four holes.
Much of the damage was done at the hideous, tricked-up 14th, where he went through the back of the green in three and found himself with no shot. Even those Popeye-like forearms could not extract the ball from the vicious rough at the first attempt. Forced to play away from the hole with his next effort owing to the sharp fall-off at the front of the green behind the flag, he needed to hole a four-foot putt in the end simply to drop ‘only’ three shots. When another was spilled following a missed fairway at the 15th, things were looking bleak indeed. The one thing in his favour was the fact the three scoring holes — the 18th, first and second — lay ahead, if he could clear his senses. He did that with a bonus birdie at the 17th, and followed it with a series of sumptuous blows. Casey has attracted a lot of heat for the fact he plays virtually all
his golf in America these days but the other side of that argument is he has rebuilt his career so successfully he now stands 14th in the world. Although he should have won a lot more — his only US victory remains his success in the 2009 Houston Open — he now has the chance to counter that criticism as well.
Here in America’s dairy heartland, Andrew ‘Beef’ Johnston (left) is also enjoying himself, following a quiet start to the year. The 28-year-old Londoner had three eagles to make it through qualifying at Walton Heath and opened up well on Thursday with a 69. Things did not go quite to plan with a second-round 73, thanks largely to a balky putter, but he looked certain to start the third round in the top 20.
‘It was a decent day, I made a couple of mistakes and duly got punished as you do in the US Open,’ he said. ‘But I’m looking forward to the last two days. You want to be in these positions and measure yourself against the best.’
Another man who came through qualifying is fellow Englishman Eddie Pepperell, who is rebuilding his career after losing his tour card last season. The 26-year-old from Oxford shot rounds of 72, 71 to give himself the chance to re-establish himself in spectacular style this weekend.
Heaven knows what to make of Kim’s wildly erratic season so far except to say he seems a man for the big occasion. The 21-year-old has done nothing of note except become the youngest winner of the Players. Now he has a chance to become the youngest non-American to win a major in the modern era.
Whatever happens to littleknown American Xander Schauffele during the rest of the tournament, he has at least made his mark on the US Open record books. In 116 previous editions, no player has finished his first round with a bogey-free 66 or better, as the 23-year-old Californian did on Thursday.
The world’s 352nd-ranked player did a good job of keeping reality at bay in the second round as well. He finished with a 73 to stand at five under for the tournament.
Meanwhile, Danny Willett withdrew before the start of his second round. The Yorkshireman shot 81 on Thursday and faces a real mental battle as much as anything to get his career back on track this summer.