Harrington must arrest rankings slide
Harrington reached a career high of third when he retained the Open Championship at Hoylake in 2008, followed by his victory in the US PGA Championship at Oakland Hills. However, it’s been largely downhill ever since. He began 2010 in fifth place, but little went right in the early months of that year and last September he dropped from 20th to 22nd, the first time he was outside the top 20 in four years.
Victory in the low-key Johor Open in Malaysia helped to redress the trend for a while but he still ended 2010 in 23rd place. In the meantime, however, Harrington has drifted back another nine spots to 32nd. This is best reflected by finishes of 16th, missed cut, 39th, 7th, disqualified and 58th since the win in Johor. Luck hasn’t always favoured him, most especially his disqualification as the result of a technical breach of the rules in Abu Dhabi the other week after he had signed for a promising first round of 65.
Perhaps he carried the disappointment of that occurrence into the Volvo Champions in Bahrain at the weekend as he finished in a share of 58th.
That really should have been a lot better given that he carded four birdies in the first six holes of his final round. Even then, though, he realised he was too far back to have a meaningful say in the destination of a title impressively captured by England’s Paul Casey and admitted to experimenting with some of the many changes he has been tinkering with over the past few weeks.
The outcome wasn’t at all pretty. Padraig’s share of 58th was worth €5,440 and he is currently 170th in the Race to Dubai.
It is, of course, extremely early in the year and Harrington will undoubtedly shoot up that list as the months go by. Even then, though, it will take time as he rests this week before heading for the United States and a succession of tournaments leading up to the Masters in early April.
The first of these is the AT & T pro-am at Pebble Beach starting on Thursday week and in which he will resume his partnership with JP McManus.
Harrington doesn’t do panic and, typically, he was still full of optimism as he made his way home from his two weeks in the Gulf.
“I’ve got work to do on my short game before going to Pebble Beach and I got caught up in some swing changes in Bahrain but overall I feel good about my game,” he pronounced.
That’s all very fine but Padraig’s many admirers would dearly like to see this reflected by his achievements on the golf course. The downward spiral in his world ranking says it all about his results since his last significant victory in 2008. It has become quite alarming and quite clearly he needs a big result soon if he is to redress the imbalance.
Not that Harrington is the only big golfing name currently struggling to find his best form. Tiger Woods certainly didn’t make much of a shape in the San Diego tournament played over his favourite Torrey Pines course at the weekend. He finished in a share of 44th on one under, 15 behind winner Bubba Watson and 14 adrift of great rival Phil Mickelson in 2nd place.
As a result, Woods remains third in the world rankings behind Westwood and Martin Kaymer while Mickelson has improved from sixth to fourth with Graeme McDowell dropping back a spot to fifth. Woods will next in action in the Dubai Desert Classic on the European Tour starting on Thursday week.
In the meantime, the Europeans will this week be concentrating on the Qatar Masters, the third of the four events on the Desert Swing. It has attracted an outstanding field led by Westwood, Kaymer, Ian Poulter, Miguel-Angel Jimenez, Ross Fisher and Peter Hanson. Paul Casey, who pipped Hanson by a shot in Bahrain, will be hoping for more of the same while much interest will also centre on the performances of US star Steve Stricker, Open champion Louis Oosthuizen, John Daly and Sergio Garcia.
The Irish in the field for the $2.5m tournament are Darren Clarke, Peter Lawrie, Damien McGrane, Michael Hoey and Paul McGinley.
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