McIlroy risks becoming the flat-track bully who can’t handle heavy going

RORY McILROY was in very good company in missing the halfway cut at the US Open but the fact he was packing his locker early alongside Tiger Woods, Jordan Spieth, Jason Day, Jon Rahm and Sergio Garcia must not lead to him dismissing it as one of those things.

One unwanted weekend off at the season’s second major it may be but that is three in a row now, while in the prime of his golfing life, so no wonder his close friend Paul McGinley is calling for McIlroy to have a rethink.

To put that hat-trick of successive failures in perspective, Jack Nicklaus was 48 when he missed his third US Open cut and he never missed two in succession at any stage of his career, let alone three.

This was Woods’s third missed cut in this event but the only one that happened up to the age of 39 came in 2006 when he played in his first tournament following the death of his father, Earl. McIlroy, lest we forget, is 29.

‘There are definitely issues that need t o be addressed,’ said McGinley, the former Ryder Cup captain and Sky Sports analyst.

‘He’s not the new kid on the block any more. When he was winning his majors, he was out on his own and drove the ball better than anyone else.

‘But now there are five or six guys who can drive the ball as long and as straight as him. This is a new phase of his career and it’s going to take a new attitude and a new drive to go with it. That’s what is missing.’

McGinley is rightly concerned that McIlroy is in danger of being stereotyped as a golf equivalent of a flat-track bully.

Give him a soft golf course with no wind and there is nobody better at shooting a low score. But, ramp up the rough, introduce some uncertainties like firm greens that you will find at a traditional US Open, and we invariably witness a pale shadow.

It ought to be of concern to the Northern Irishman that not one pundit picked him as ‘one to follow’ in the build-up.

‘The second thing that is missing is his ability to play tough courses,’ added McGinley. ‘His CV is littered with success but it’s not littered with successes on brutally tough courses that basically become a war of attrition, like the one we’re seeing here at Shinnecock Hills.

‘It’s something he has to sort out to continue on the tremendous early part of his career.’

Another factor is surely the impact that not completing the career Grand Slam is having on his performances in the majors in general.

Since 2015, McIlroy has been trying to win the Masters to complete the set. Is it just a coincidence that we have barely seen the real McIlroy in any of the majors since that date?

His final round problems at the Masters in April, when he barely laid a glove on eventual winner Patrick Reed were plainly those of a player burdened by the enormity of what he was trying to achieve. Here, McIlroy blamed his calamitous first-round 80 on the fact he had not played in the wind for a while but it was a poor excuse for a man who had spent 10 days in the area to that point.

Dustin Johnson had come straight from humid, windless Memphis and coped all right.

The fact McIlroy birdied four holes late on when expectations were gone was indicative of a man playing with a brain cluttered with too many thoughts.

Johnson’s wise coach Butch Harmon was surely on the right lines when he said: ‘Rory needs to just go out and play rather than worry about how you play. He is one of the most natural players in the world but this week every part of his game seemed wrong.’

Next up for McIlroy is the Travelers Championship in Connecticut this week at an egomassaging country club venue that is right up his alley.

But it is the tests next month, at the Irish Open at Ballyliffin and The Open, at formidabl Carnoustie, where we need to see some evidence that he is finally maturing as a golfer.

As for Woods, he was more sanguine about having the weekend off and rightly so. He was caught up in the worst part of the draw and playing only his second US Open in five years.

At 42, and after all he has been t hrough, Woods knows t hat missed cuts are going to be part of the territory from now on.

Then there is Spieth. We always wondered what would happen when he stopped holing every putt he looked at and now we are seeing the answer. In six tournaments since the Masters, he has not registered a top-20 finish and the Open champion’s season is in danger of unravelling.

Meanwhile, at the top of the leaderboard, world No1 Johnson — bidding for his second US Open in three years — took a four-stroke lead into the third round, with English trio Tommy Fleetwood, Justin Rose and Ian Poulter still in touch in a tie for fourth place at five adrift. Fellow countryman Matt Fitzpatrick was two shots further back.