Rory McIlroy would have been under absolutely no illusions that he needed to fly out of the blocks on Sunday if he was going to stand any chance of catching Scottie Scheffler and prevent the world number one from winning The Open Championship.
It was nearly impossible to imagine the Claret Jug in the hands of anyone else other than Scottie Scheffler heading into the final round of The Open Championship. He held a four-shot lead at Royal Portrush with 18 holes to play.
It seemed likely that a charge was going to come from somewhere. Scheffler had briefly opened the door for his rivals at the PGA Championship. And it was hard to imagine that the 29-year-old could be as good on the greens as he had been over the first three days.
Many would have been looking to Rory McIlroy to make that charge. Unfortunately for those behind the ropes, that charge never quite came.
Rory McIlroy had one particular issue throughout the final round of The Open Championship
McIlroy never got below two under par for the day. With Scheffler reaching three under par for the first five holes, it seemed that there was no chance of a late twist.
McIlroy can be pleased with his week, but he may be a little disappointed that he could not find that extra gear during the final round.
And speaking on The Smylie Show after following his pairing for the final round, Smylie Kaufman noted the problem McIlroy seemed to have on several occasions over the course of Sunday.
“The way I would describe Rory’s round today, at the beginning of the day, he was just too in between when he had scoring opportunities – it was either just the wrong hole location with the wrong wind. I’m even looking at the numbers and I’m thinking, god, what is he going to hit here? Too often, I saw Rory trying to figure out what kind of club to hit, where typically he’s grabbing a club and going. He’s such a quick, fast-paced, momentum player, and early in the day, I just felt like there was decision on, the wind wasn’t really a factor at all, it blew like five miles an hour, but it was just annoying enough with some of the hole locations early where it was giving Rory some indecision about what clubs to hit,” he said.
“I know Scottie Scheffler shot 17 under, but you look where they put these hole locations, I wish the PGA Tour would push the boundaries like The Open Championship did this week. You can do I guess when you have greens that are rolling a four on the stimpmeter, you can put them on an ant hill and it’s going to be okay. They’re literally putting these hole locations on two to three degrees of slope. You don’t see that on the PGA Tour, that’s not something that happens because, guess what, the stimp, guys are typically playing on on the PGA Tour are going to be in that 12, 13 range. That’s probably about right. Fast weeks are 14.
“But in those first four holes, you want to get the crowd behind you early, just to try to get that energy in Portrush, the whole of Northern Ireland around you. And the first hole, he stripes a seven iron and it goes to 40 feet long and you’re just thinking, man, alright, that’s fine, par on one, not a big deal, that’s not one that you just have to birdie. He birdies two. And three, he was a little bit in between clubs, but still par’s fine at three. And then four’s where I feel like the air went out of the gym a little bit because Rory had 186, you can see that hole location, it’s three degrees of slope where this hole is cut, you never see a hole location cut on the arrows – that’s how much slope was on the fourth green. And I didn’t think they’d put a hole here, I thought they’d put it more in the middle of the green. But 186 for him on a day where it’s not windy, that’s a seven iron. But the problem is for him, the seven iron is going to get up in a five mile an hour wind, he’s worried that it’s not going to cover the front, you would have to argue that at 170, seven iron’s at least getting the front cover, and you would think, alright, if you’re not comfortable hitting a cut six iron and holding the wind a little bit, then let’s just hammer a seven iron, give ourselves 30 feet, not the end of the world. But he tried to hit this floaty cut six iron, and he just made a poor swing and hit it in the worst possible place and had nothing.”
The Open Championship may have come a week or two too soon for Rory McIlroy
It really felt as though The Open came a week too early for McIlroy. Obviously, he had had his issues over the summer as he searched for his future targets after winning The Masters.
A top 10 at the Travelers Championship was followed by a second place finish at the Genesis Scottish Open. That suggested that McIlroy was rediscovering some form again. However, it cannot be forgotten that Scheffler took several months to get going after returning from injury earlier this year.
McIlroy was not able to find that moment of magic at the crucial time during the final major of the year. And that definitely spoke to the idea that he is still working his way back towards his best.
Obviously, catching Scheffler is looking like an incredibly daunting task right now. However, it is arguably McIlroy’s turn to take plenty of positives from the fact that he finished tied for seventh at a major when he was not firing on all cylinders.
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