Rory McIlroy played alongside Akshay Bhatia during the first two rounds of The Masters last week.
After round one of The Masters, it was so wholesome to hear Bhatia share how ‘cool’ it was to play alongside McIlroy.
Augusta National is a very special place, and Bhatia playing alongside McIlroy – someone who he idolised as a child – must have been an unforgettable experience.
After the second round, Bhatia described McIlroy’s birdies on holes 10 and 11 as a ‘joke’, in a good way of course.
The 23-year-old left-hander is clearly a huge fan of the now five-time major champion.
The Californian is a supremely talented golfer in his own right, and already has two PGA Tour wins to his name.
However, it’s fair to say that McIlroy is on another level entirely, as he is to pretty much every other golfer in the world, aside from Scottie Scheffler.
What Akshay Bhatia noticed about Rory McIlroy at The Masters after playing with him
Last week, McIlroy recovered from an opening round 72 to post a six-under 66 on day two at Augusta National.
Meanwhile, Bhatia opened up with rounds of 70 and 76.
The two-time PGA Tour winner was hugely impressed by what he saw from the Northern Irishman during the first two rounds of The Masters.
He responded when asked to give his verdict on McIlroy’s ability, when speaking on the Golf Sub Par Podcast:
“I didn’t find out my tee time until Tuesday or Wednesday and I was going to the first tee and I was never expecting to be in that group, just based off world ranking and what everyone else wants to see. I checked my phone and saw Rory McIlroy and Ludvig. Ludvig I have played with multiple times, but it was the first time that I got to play with Rory McIlroy.
“He was playing as good as any, the best of the week. I have never seen someone hit a driver that good. He played great the first round and then made a couple of doubles and somehow I beat him the first round. I was like man that guy played so freaking good. You almost feel like how can I compete with that in a sense. He hits it far, he hits is straight, his wedge play was great, he didn’t miss a putt that was inside 10 feet on Friday. It was really cool for me to see as he has kind of been the guy of our generation to finally cap that off, it really inspired me and a lot of people watching that final round.“
Paul McGinley blamed Bhatia for McIlroy’s double bogey on 15 on day one of The Masters
McIlroy inexplicably took seven shots to play the 15th hole at Augusta during the first round of The Masters.
He was four-under par standing on the 15th tee, and after his double bogey on that hole, he doubled the 17th as well to end up level par for the day.
McIlroy’s double bogey on the 15th came out of absolutely nowhere, but Paul McGinley bizarrely suggested that Bhatia may have been to blame for the 35-year-old’s lapse in concentration:
“I want to take you back to the 15th hole. Rory was imperious up until then. Playing beautifully. Very focused, very concentrated and then a couple of things happened there as was getting ready to play what was a difficult chip but not impossible on 15,” he said.
“The first was his playing partner, Bhatia, hit his second shot in the water. He took forever to take the drop and after almost 10 practice swings he then went and played his pitch shot. It wasn’t a bad shot from where it was but it went back on to Rory’s line.
“Now from there Rory has to wait for him even though he is ready to go and he is a quick player, one of the quickest players on the tour. Bhatia has to walk all the way around the water and all the way up on to the green to mark his ball.
“Then as Rory is getting ready to play again he has to wait for the 16th tee box which is right behind and the playing people having to hit there too. So again, a bit of a drop in concentration, he hasn’t got into his routine as he has before and I think he got distracted there. That is why the execution wasn’t quite what we have seen up until there. That was a difficult shot, it wasn’t impossible, it was a miss hit and I think it was down to concentration more than anything else. It could well have been a factor that those two incidents happened and slowed him down to almost three minutes from when it was his shot to play before he actually played it. That is a long time for Rory McIlroy, one of the quickest players in the game.”
Even if Bhatia was extremely pedestrian when going about his business, McIlroy should be experienced enough to not allow those kind of things to affect him.
In McIlroy’s defence though, he never suggested that Bhatia was at fault for the ridiculously poor seven that he made on the famous par-five.
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