Left field

No Woods, no problem … but for how long?

Tiger Woods hacked and shanked his way to a two-round score of five over par at this year’s British Open, missing just the fifth cut of his professional career and only his second in a major championship.

Facing a Tiger-less weekend must have had television executives and sponsors sweating. The 2008 British Open, which Woods missed recovering from reconstructive knee surgery, saw TV ratings of the final round on ABC plummet 13.3 percent from the previous year.

But the ’09 British Open had a secret weapon, Tom Watson.

The 59 year-old self proclaimed ‘geezer’ was battling not only course, but he was fighting father time. A victory would have made him the oldest major champion on the PGA tour by 11 years.

After 54 holes, Watson looked poised to shatter the record as he led the field heading into Sunday’s final round at Turnberry.

However, Stewart Cink sunk the fairytale ending with his two-foot birdie putt on the fourth playoff hole, cutting short Watson’s chase of immortality.

But Watson provided more than enough compelling drama over the final two days to keep viewers hooked. Watson would drain a lengthy putt, then ABC would pull-up video from the famous ‘Duel in the Sun’.  Watson would bump and run to within five feet of the cup, then viewers were treated to a side-by-side look, comparing his swing from today to his last major championship victory 26 years ago — at Royal Birkdale. Woods’ missed cut quickly became an afterthought.

British Open proves elementary for Watson, tough on Tiger

It is fair to say we all expected an American with a surname beginning with W to be soaring up the British Open leaderboard but everyone has been shocked that it is 59-year-old senior Tom Watson topping the strong field and not a certain Tiger Woods.

Whilst the world number one toiled in calm conditions at Turnberry’s Ailsa course on Thursday, five-times Open champion Watson was recording a bogey-free five-under-par 65 to take the early clubhouse lead.

“Yesterday and the day before, playing the practice rounds I felt very good about the way I was hitting the ball and the way I was putting the ball,” Watson told reporters. “And it was not much of a surprise for me to go out there and get under par.”

Many will expect the eight-times major winner to fall away and not remain in contention but may I remind you cynics of the performance of another past master, Greg Norman, at last year’s championship at Birkdale. Norman finished third after leading going into the final round.

And it is not just Watson who is proving a torch bearer for the elder members of the golf circuit. Fifty-two year-old twice Open champion Mark O’Meara went out early and fired a solid three-under par 67 to sit alongside 1989 champion Mark Calcavecchia – one year shy of his 50th birthday.

Much of the talk at Turnberry before the championship had been about the chances of young Briton Rory McIlroy and teenaged Japanese sensation Ryo Ishikawa lifting the Claret Jug but Watson and co have shown them they still have a lot to learn on the South Ayrshire links.

In light of the fact that veteran Kenny Perry, 48, came within a whisker of winning this year’s Masters, only succumbing to eventual winner Angel Cabrera in a play-off, could this be the year the veterans fights back?

The Open golf gets underway, but where’s the wind and rain?

Embarking on my first British Open, I was of the understanding the weather would be wet and windy and the scoring tough but my week thus far has been spent in shorts and t-shirts at a surprisingly benign Turnberry.

As nice as it is for a roving reporter to be out in the warm sunshine, fielding questions to the world’s best golfers on one of Britain’s finest courses, it would be interesting to see the usual wind and rain to see how good these guys really are.

When Irishman Padraig Harrington retained the Claret Jug at Birkdale last year he did so after enduring a fierce battle with the elements as well as a strong field.

His ability to shoot a four-under-par 32 on the back nine whilst battling wind that was gusting above 50mph was golf of the highest order and a joy to watch, albeit on a television in the Reuters office.

This year I was expecting the same conditions but as it stands, with sunny weather, the Ailsa course’s generous fairways and flat greens could become a birdie fest which we have grown accustomed to on the PGA Tour.

The uniqueness of the Open is that it is an event which is like no other, played on a seaside links with hard and fast fairways and blustery conditions which give spectators a chance to see how skilful the best players have to be.

Rory McIlroy: Genuine Open Contender

Rory McIlroy can win The Open Championship at Turnberry this weekend.

The bushy-haired 20-year old from Northern Ireland is playing only his second Open, and first as a professional. But he is such a talent that he is capable of pulling off the biggest win in a major championship since the 21-year old Tiger Woods ran off with The U.S. Masters in 1997.

Rory’s youth should not hamper his chances. In fact it could encourage him. Only Tiger himself — who only a lunatic would argue is not the greatest golfer who ever lived — has a comparable early career record.  Tiger had just turned pro when he won the 1996 Las Vegas Invitational as a 20 year-old, but McIlroy was still a teenager when he secured his first victory as a professional: the high profile Dubai Desert Classic earlier this year.

Youthful prodigies are rare in golf. The Open’s two-time defending champion Padraig Harrington did not even turn pro until he was 24. But if you watch Rory play it immediately becomes apparent why he has had so much success.

I was lucky enough to arrive at Wentworth Golf Club in south west London a few minutes before Rory was due to begin his 3rd round at the BMW PGA Championship.

The first shot I saw him hit, his drive at the Par 3 second, was unlike any that his older peers had attempted in the groups before him. The ball fizzed extraordinarily high, drawing in right to left over the greenside bunker and onto the pin. He made the birdie putt, and proceeded to go round in a 7-under par 65, including eight birdies. At the 18th, a severe dog-leg par 5, he was so confident he smashed his drive well over 300 yards and around the corner of the fairway. Afterwards he just turned to his caddy and grinned.