It still quite easy to recall the Open Championship of 2006 at Hoylake, for a whole bunch of reasons.
Some personal, the unbelievably hot weather, maybe the best rental house The Courier has ever secured, and my assistant to cover the championship getting locked in a toilet with an amorous admirer, are among those fondly remembered.
But for the purposes of this column, the two worth detailing now are of course Tiger Woods’ victory and his emotional response to it, and Sergio Garcia’s choice of clothing on the final day.
It’s not always remembered that Sergio was just a shot behind Tiger going into Sunday. Here was the chance, we thought, of a natural rivalry to Woods to develop.
But that idea floundered on the first tee. Sergio showed up dressed top to tail in bright yellow. He might as well have had a white flag as well.
Particularly as after a short pause Tiger strode purposefully – in his trademark battle red of course – on to the tee, followed by his bruiser of a caddie Steve Williams, and flanked by the bodyguards that were probably more to do with intimidation than protection.
If I’d been Sergio’s caddie I’d have contemplated throwing the towel in right there. The body language was established, Tiger coasted to victory, Sergio floundered again.
It was later related that a friend of Woods, on seeing Sergio’s yellow clothing choice, texted the champion “Congrats for beating Tweety-Pie!”
Fast forward 11 years and the final day of the Dubai Desert Classic, where Sergio had a handsome lead he converted into the title, while Tiger had departed for home without even completing the formality of missing the cut
Sergio played in yellow again – just the shirt though. Knowing his testy relationship with Tiger, you wouldn’t be entirely surprised if it was a cheeky statement about that day in 2006 and how it relates to both men’s fortunes now.
Yet hopefully not, because it seems Garcia has matured and settled after so many years when he got in his own way and failed to finish what his talent as the premier ball-striker in the game – certainly pre-Rory – deserved.
At 37, he’s not destined to be majorless in his career quite yet. His putting foibles reasonably cured, he still looks worth the wager on a course where ball-striking is the paramount attribute…for example the next two Open venues, Royal Birkdale and Carnoustie.
Meanwhile the question has to be now whether Woods will even get to those Opens. Back spasms shortened his time in Dubai, and manager Mark Steinberg insisted these were unrelated to the nerve damage that led to his long absence from the game.
Even if you believe “Steiny” – and a lot of people will have trouble with that given past experiences – it does illustrate that Tiger is working with a battered body with far more miles on the clock than his 41 years would suggest.
We’ll never know the truth anyway. Another vignette from 2006 sticks in the memory, from Tiger’s post-victory press conference.
Amidst all the joy and congraultation, one writer asked what he was going to drink from the Claret Jug, to which he replied “a beverage of my choosing”.
The writer, not unreasonably, pressed him for a proper answer, to which Tiger employed his best death-stare and repeated his previous non-answer.
He wouldn’t even give up his favourite tipple in his hour of triumph. Looking for insights from this most guarded of men is a hopeless cause.
Champions are sure thing?
Scottish Golf continue to tinker with their championships and what it means to win them, with an annnoucement that all matchplay champions will now automatically be selected for Home International teams.
This is intended to prevent what happened last year, when neither men’s matchplay champion George Duncan nor women’s champion Ailsa Summers were selected by Scotland.
Duncan’s non-selection was not exactly surprising given the Windyhill player came from absolutely nowhere to win at Royal Aberdeen.
Carnoustie’s Summers, however, was a tried and tested international player who simply had some previous availability issues due to her job.
Prior to Duncan and Summers last year, national matchplay champions being in the Homes teams was almost a given anyway. But in order to make qualification for the national shirt as transparent as possible, Scottish Golf has instigated a qualification process via Orders of Merit, reducing the scope of the old tried and tested “behind the green door” selectors’ conferences which as often as not came up with the team everybody thought should be selected anyway.
I’m not old-fashioned by instinct but I always thought that was the best way to pick teams in amateur golf. There were so few obvious miscarriages of justice that it always seemed better to put the decision into the hands of non-playing captains and veteran players who knew what it took to win events and national caps.
Maybe this way we’ll be even more successful. But I’m not convinced..