McIlroy and Harrington lose their way
The Irish duo have been paired together for today’s third round at Royal Lytham & St Annes and stand 12 shots off the impressive overnight lead of American Brandt Snedeker after they each finished their second rounds on two over par, Harrington having shot a two-over-par 72, McIlroy an even more disappointing 75.
Both had come into the championship with the form of genuine contenders and after the opening round their days had started with such high hopes, with McIlroy starting three shots off the lead following a first-round 67.
Harrington had ended his first round with a birdie at the last and begun his second with another at the first before moving to two under at the turn and looking like a third Claret Jug and fourth Major was a distinct possibility.
McIlroy, so keen to get himself off the one Major mark 25 months after landing his first at the 2011 US Open, started his second round poorly with a bogey at the par-four third, when his approach out of a nasty lie in the right rough landed on the fourth tee box, to the astonishment of Japanese player Toshinori Motu and his caddie as he prepared to play away.
Yet the Holywood golfer made amends with a birdie at the fourth and did like at the seventh following a bogey at the sixth.
Then it began to go very badly wrong with a double bogey on the par-three ninth having such a demoralising effect on McIlroy that he would not recover.
Birdie chances went begging at 10 and 11, he overclubbed at 12 with his approach scooting to the back of green on the way to bogey and then missed a short putt at 13.
A visit to a fairway bunker at 14 resulted in another bogey and sent him to one over for the tournament and when he bogeyed the 17th having splashed into a waterlogged bunker, he was 10 shots off the pace.
At least he didn’t hit anyone off the 15th tee this time, as he had done on Thursday, a shot that cost him a signed glove, dinner for two and a hotel room for his young victim.
“Yeah, it wasn’t the best day out there,” McIlroy said. “I was doing pretty well just to hang in there around par on the front nine and making a double on the ninth there was sort of the turning point in the round. I couldn’t really recover from that.
“I wasn’t committing to my tee shots and it was two minds a few times about what shots to hit off tees.”
Still, McIlroy felt he could still be in with a shout tomorrow if he could remedy his ills and shoot a low number in today’s third round.
“Obviously Snedeker is a little bit ahead at the minute, but I feel like if I can maybe get it back to where I was at the start of the day today, somewhere around there, three, four under going into Sunday, I think I’d still have a great chance.”
Harrington feels he needs something a little more having been two under for the tournament at the turn yesterday.
“It’s frustrating,” he said. “I was looking to go forward, and obviously with 10 under leading, if you’re in there three or four under, you know you’re well in the tournament. At two over you’re hoping for miracles on the weekend.”
As always, though, Harrington was looking into ways he might find a more conventional solution.
“I shot two 66s on the weekend before, and certainly something like that as good as Snedeker’s 10 under is, there’s not too many people out there pressing.
“If he’s out there on his own, the likelihood is he’ll come back to the field. If a couple of other guys get to seven or eight, the likelihood is that they’ll all move to 11 or 12 sort of thing.
“It’s hard to be isolated on your own at the top of the leaderboard. The best thing for me would be that he has a big lead.”
Adam Scott’s birdie at the last yesterday evening to take him to nine under, a shot behind Snedeker, may well have removed that scenario.
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