Rory Mcllroy - US Masters …will he win or not? by Iain Carter BBC Golf Correspondent
Four down, four to go. And then the big one.
That’s the scenario for Rory McIlroy as he builds towards the Masters, the tournament he most wants to win.
The 28 year old from Northern Ireland has deliberately chosen a busy schedule as a prequel to the first major of the year, the only one of the big four he has yet to win. He wanted to employ the same plan last year but it was ruined by injury.
After a three month sabbatical at the end of 2017, McIlroy is as fit and strong as he has ever been. But he is now enduring the longest winless streak of his glittering career.
That statistic starts to crank up the pressure as Augusta looms ever closer.
The year began encouragingly. It was impressive watching him in the Middle East where he was third in Abu Dhabi and then runner up to Haotong Li in Dubai.
But earlier this month McIlroy’s putting touch deserted him on the bumpy greens of Pebble Beach, where he missed the cut and scraping into the top 20 without contending at the Genesis Open in Los Angeles provided further evidence that Rory is not quite ready to roar just yet.
“I'm the sort of person who believes that I can enter a tournament next week and go there and win,” McIlroy said in a brilliant discussion with three times major champion Padraig Harrington, which was recently published in the Irish Independent.
The exchange was fascinating. Harrington replied: “Yeah, I get that, but sometimes I look at you and think: 'He's just not tournament sharp.'”
McIlroy accepted the point. “Of course,” he said.
“I mean I wanted to play a heavier schedule last year leading up to Augusta but injury didn't allow me. This year will be better. Augusta is going to be my ninth event. I've played two in the Middle East and I'm playing six out of the next seven weeks.”
“Yeah, I think that's a more positive way of going about it,” the sage Harrington replied.
And the benefits will surely be felt if McIlroy is in the hunt for that elusive green jacket at Augusta in April. But to give himself his best chance of getting to that stage, he knows he needs to end that winless streak which stretches back to September 2016.
Where better to shed that monkey from his back than at PGA National in Florida this week where McIlroy competes in the Honda Classic? Victory there back in 2012 took the then 22 year old to the top of the world rankings for the first time.
Two years later he was runner up but did not make the cut in 2015 and 16 before missing last year’s event because of the back and rib issues that so undermined his all his 2017 efforts.
Watching the current world number 10 play, I am convinced he remains the most gifted golfer on the planet.
The speed and balance of his swing is the action of a supreme athlete and for someone measuring only 5 feet 9 inches tall, he propels the ball every bit as far as a 6 feet 4 inch Dustin Johnson.
On the the other hand, McIIroy is not the most efficient from 100 yards in, his course management can be questionable and his putting is streaky.
When it all comes together, though, he is unstoppable. He won his first two majors - the 2011 US Open and the following year’s PGA Championship each by eight strokes.
And, having won the 2014 Open, he only needs the Masters to complete the career grand slam and join golf’s most elite company.
Were he to move alongside Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Ben Hogan, Gary Player and Gene Sarazen in completing the full set of majors, the foundations of such a triumph will have been laid right now.
That’s the McIlroy mission. He already has four major titles to his name and if he could knock off the Masters there is every chance of many more of the game’s biggest prizes heading in his direction.
The longer he waits for a green jacket, though, the harder it will be and the sort of nagging doubts such frustrations induce could undermine his major chances elsewhere.
Harrington has two Opens and a PGA to his name and at 46 is one of the game’s elder-statesmen. Returning to his lengthy and intriguing conversation with McIlroy in the Irish Independent, there was this nugget.
“You're at a stage, Rory, where you're still trying to get more . . . actually, I'm going to say this, and it's probably not what you want to hear, but four majors for you is a failure,” Harrington said.
“I 100 per cent agree,” McIlroy stated.
That’s exactly why he is such a busy golfer at the moment.
