Bitter collapse for Pádraig

PÁDRAIG HARRINGTON must have felt it was Ground-hog Day, as for the second year in succession he completed his Masters warm-up with a bitterly disappointing final round at the Shell Houston Open.

As Tiger Woods broke the ice with his fellow professionals with a practice round at Augusta National, the Dubliner crashed and burned in alarming fashion at Redstone.

Last year, Harrington racked up penalty strokes with abandon as he closed with a 76 and there was a familiar look to his scorecard last night, fighting a losing battle with a hook and following rounds of 69, 69 and 72 with a five-over par 77 to finish in the bottom half of the field on one-under par.

Just four strokes behind Anthony Kim and Hunter Mahan starting the day, the world No 10 was in water three times in the first six holes as he double bogeyed the third, bogeyed the fourth and double bogeyed the par-four sixth to slump to five over for the day.

He bogeyed the par-three seventh as well to be six over through seven and while he birdied the par-five eighth to turn in 41 and birdied at the 12th and 13th to get back to just three over for the day; pulled shots at the 14th and 15th leading to back to back bogeys at the 14th and 15th and a less than inspiring dress rehearsal for this week’s major test.

As Kim battled to hold off the Augusta native Vaughan Taylor down the stretch in Houston, Woods was busy getting ready for the biggest challenge of his career.

At 2pm local time today (7pm in Ireland) he will answer questions from the world’s media in the interview room before undergoing what promises to be an even more severe examination of his mental state amongst the azaleas and dogwoods.

Putting in a decent performance at Augusta after a five months without a competitive outing is likely to make odds of 1/6 of him making the cut look like a decent bet.

At 1.39 pm yesterday, he took another step towards preparing himself for what is certain to be an emotional week when he strode onto the driving range at Augusta National, hit around a dozen shots under the gaze of his coach Hank Haney and walked to the putting green where he chatted briefly with his frequent Ryder Cup partner, Jim Furyk.

Minutes later he headed to the far side of the clubhouse and fell into an emotional embrace with Mark O’Meara, the 1998 Masters champion, who was just coming off the ninth green.

Joining his one-time mentor for a spin around the fabled back nine, Woods lashed a couple of tee shots down the 10th hole and looked on as O’Meara pulled his effort badly.

Turning to the gaggle of onlookers who had gathered to watch Woods tee off, O’Meara smiled and joked: “I gagged on that one.

“I’m not used to playing with this kid.”

Winning back the trust of his fans and friends will be the biggest challenge of Woods’ career and former major winners Paul Azinger and Curtis Strange will be fascinated onlookers this week.

“I think we’re going to see a humbled and humiliated Tiger Woods,” Azinger told ESPN. “I think he’s going to be accessible to the crowd, possibly for the first time ever. Yeah, he’ll put his blinders on when he gets inside the ropes, but it’ll be a different Tiger.

“The most intriguing thing about this whole thing is that we’re talking about the greatest player who’s ever played the game. And he’s never faced anything like this. I don’t think he has no idea how he’s going to react.

“This will be the greatest challenge he has ever faced or ever will face. No doubt about it. For him to go out there and perform at a level that we’re used to is going to be tough.

“This will be the greatest challenge he has ever faced or ever will face. No doubt about it. For him to go out there and perform at a level that we’re used to is going to be tough. There’ll be some chit chat.

“You talk about the pressure Tiger Woods has embraced when he has been loved. They loved him and immortalised him. This is now a humbled and in some case scorned Tiger Woods. It’s a different form of pressure. This is unique, something he has never faced before.

“All I care about on Thursday is the look on his face, the look on his eyes, his emotion. We saw an angry Tiger Woods at the British Open. There’s a guy who for a career had controlled his emotion and for that week his emotions controlled him. Will his emotions control him again?

“There are going to some great close ups. I want to see when he misses a five footer for the first time. Is it that angry Tiger Woods or is it a different Tiger Woods.

“I’ll be looking and studying his face because that’s where it will be.”

Strange agreed with Azinger’s assessment of the daunting challenge facing Woods, adding: “When you go to a championship you can only have one thing on your mind and that is playing the golf course.

“Augusta is such a mental golf course, such a second short golf course, such an exhausting golf course.

“If I had something going on in the background, I’d be toast.”