Duval: We can catch Tiger

DAVID DUVAL and Tiger Woods are friendly enough to spend the week before the Open Championship holidaying, golfing and fishing together in Ireland.

Their most recent visit ended as recently as last weekend after they had sampled the delights of Portmarnock, The European Club and Mount Juliet combined with a bit of fishing at The K-Club. But this relationship doesn’t change the fact that they are keen rivals when it comes to the competitive side of the game. Or, that Duval doesn’t resent the implication from such eminent sources as Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and Tom Watson that other players are not trying hard enough to knock Woods off his pedestal; and even more so that they aren’t as good or as committed as the top players of the previous era.

“It’s easy to suggest things like that when you can’t compare,” insisted the man who won so impressively at Royal Lytham St Annes 12 months ago. “You can say that David Duval doesn’t have the guts or the drive, or Phil Mickelson doesn’t, or Sergio (Garcia), that they’re not good enough or too spoiled. It’s something you can’t argue.

“Look at the work ethic of those people out on the practice range. Then you hear of the great camaraderie of 20-25 years ago that doesn’t exist today. It wasn’t as businesslike then. There wasn’t as much attention on one’s health and fitness. It was get done and hit a few balls and crack open a cold one.

“Do I take offence to these remarks? Not necessarily, because every man is entitled to an opinion and I just wish there was a way to compare. I just think it’s a waste of time.”

Friendship or not, Duval isn’t prepared to concede any feeling of inefficiency when it comes to dealing with the phenomenon that is Woods. He won’t accept, either, that Woods is more talented than some of the other top players and insists there isn’t a whole lot between the cream of the crop when they are all performing at their best.

“Everybody knows that Tiger is extremely efficient at what he does,” he accepts, before adding: “I think if Tiger Woods is playing his best and if other players are at their best, there is not as much difference between them as many people believe. The difference lies where he has managed an approach that worked pretty well for Jack Nicklaus, minimising his mistakes, getting it in play and not compounding errors. I did a very fine job of that at Lytham last year and other places where I’ve won golf tournaments.

“I think there are players just as talented. He is mechanically as sound as anybody. He works as hard as anybody. He tends to out-think a lot of players and out-manage a lot of players. There are no players more talented but there are guys as talented when they’re at their best.”

Duval has been making plenty of mistakes recently in a disappointing season that has produced only one top-ten finish in 15 starts and missed cuts in four of his last five events.

‘‘Do I think I’m going to wake up cured tomorrow morning? No, I don’t, but I think it can happen this week. I’ve been on the cusp of good things but I haven’t quite got over the edge.

‘‘I know it hasn’t felt good for some time, however it can start feeling good real quick and there’s a little bit of that in what happened at Lytham. I wouldn’t even hit balls on that range because it was blowing left to right at 25mph and that just accentuated the slice I was already hitting.

‘‘So I didn’t hit balls but just managed to get it in fairways, figured out a way to play the golf course and went from there. And I know if I do those things this week that I can win this tournament regardless of how I played the last few months and regardless of how I feel right now.’’

Last year’s three-shot victory over Ryder Cup Swede Niclas Fasth, that brought Duval a first major title after several near misses, was expected to be the first of many.

‘‘I was very proud of my victory last year. I don’t believe I quite understood the impact it had until I got to some other places outside the US and realised the reception of the people was tremendous, and realised if there is a world Open, this is it and I’m a very lucky man to have won my first major in it.

‘‘I lost a little bit of focus after last year. I got side-tracked, I discovered some other things in life and was too absorbed in how I’m swinging the golf club. I seemed to forget that at Lytham last year I won the golf tournament, certainly hitting the ball well, but not nearly as well as I’m capable of.

‘‘I’m thinking about getting back to what made me so good at playing the game, which was simplicity. It was a bit of a slow realisation, things like walking off the course at Bethpage (in last month’s US Open) having shot 11 over and missed the cut and thinking how did I do that?

‘‘Those kind of things (make you realise) and then you say okay, my strategy has been a little different, my patience has been a little bit different, and it’s just a matter of correcting those things.

‘‘I’ve played pretty darn good for nine years as a professional, I’ve had about four or five bad months, I recognise some of the things that I’ve been doing and if I can correct those things and go another nine or ten years and have five bad months in that time, I’ll be a happy man.’’