‘Incredible fire’ can fuel Scott’s assault for more majors, believes Norman

Former world number one Greg Norman believes fellow Australian Adam Scott can use his Masters victory to propel his career to even greater heights.

Following his victory, Scott said he would seek out Norman for a beer to discuss his triumph, and the two-time British Open champion believes his countryman can now follow in his footsteps by claiming more majors.

“Adam is a great player and I’m confident this victory will catapult him to win more majors,” Norman said in a statement. “It will not surprise me if he wins more major championships than any other Australian golfer in history.

“Adam’s an incredible competitor. He’s not a guy that wants to sit back and relax and rest on his laurels. He has incredible fire within his system. And a victory like this is going to give him tremendous confidence as he moves forward in his career.”

Scott was quick to hail the influence of Norman in the aftermath of his victory, and was hoping to arrange a meeting with the man who he described as an ‘icon’.

“Australia’s a proud sporting nation and this was one notch on the belt that we’d never got. It’s amazing that it’s come down to me, Marc (Leishman) and Jason Day, it could have been any of us.

“But there was one guy that inspired a nation of golfers and that’s Greg Norman. He’s been incredible to me and all the young golfers in Australia and part of this definitely belongs to him.

“Anyone near to my age, he was the best player in the world, an icon. Everything about the way he handled himself was incredible. He was a role model and he has devoted so much time to myself and other Australian players who came after him. He is incredibly generous. Most of us feel he could have slipped a green jacket on for sure.”

For Scott’s mentor Charlie Earp the result came as a surprise as he feared his protégé was too nice.

“He is such a nice guy I feared he may have been too nice to win one,” he said.

“I told him a couple of years ago he had to get some mongrel in him and yesterday there it was. I said to him to take it out on the golf ball. Don’t take it out on yourself. He has done it now.”

But his close friends knew last Christmas that Scott was ready to strike. He’s still close to his friends from his teenage days, including former Queensland Bulls cricketer Aaron Nye. When Scott returned there over Christmas, Nye had a novel request.

“I said ‘no pressure mate, but I really want you to win The Masters’,” Nye said yesterday. “He looked back and said ‘so do I’, with that little smile as if to say ‘it’s going to happen’.”

As Scott was celebrating, Earp’s mind flickered back to his first sighting of Scott as a nine-year-old “with a swing so pure, it looked like a professional tour player”.

At 18, Scott was sent to college in Las Vegas for 18 months to learn how to fend for himself as much as toimprove his golf game but his affection for his old friends was such that in 2008, after accumulating millions in prize money, he flew a group, including Nye, to America and had them sent to the Titleist factory to be given specially fitted clubs as well as taking in the US Open.