Golf: Garcia - I'm getting closer to Tiger

Sergio Garcia said thanks to Tiger Woods today - and then spoke of how he hopes to show at the US Open this week that he really is getting closer to him.

Of all the 18 Europeans in this week’s line-up, none has the same confidence as Garcia at the moment.

His last two finishes on the US Tour have been first and second.

But it still says everything about the current state of the game that Woods was not playing in the first of those and Woods was the one who beat him in the other - by seven!

The world number one is an incredible even-money favourite in Tulsa for what would be a fifth successive major triumph.

But Garcia states: ‘‘There’s still a long way to go. I’m working hard and I think I’m getting better and better.

‘‘I expect myself to keep improving a lot and getting closer to the level he’s playing at so I’ll be able to challenge him.’’

Asked if he felt lucky or unlucky to have come along in the same era the 21-year-old Spaniard said: ‘‘Probably both. I feel lucky because thanks to Tiger the level has been raised and purses and the image of golf worldwide is getting a lot bigger thanks to him.

‘‘But a little unlucky too because it’s tougher to win a tournament and that’s what you want to do.

‘‘Overall, though, I feel lucky. He’s getting everybody to a level that we probably thought we couldn’t get.’’

Talk of a career-long tussle between the two certainly did not look fanciful talk in the US PGA at Medinah 22 months ago.

Woods came out on top, but only after a thrilling duel best remembered for Garcia’s ‘‘eyes shut’’ shot from the base of a tree at the 16th.

‘‘I expected to be able to challenge him week-in, week-out after that,’’ he admits.

But it did not happen. Garcia, still only 19 at the time, did become the youngest player in Ryder Cup history a month later and went straight from that to victories in the German Masters and Dunhill Cup.

But his win in the Colonial tournament three weeks ago was his first since then.

He had gone into the 1999 US PGA needing a top four finish to guarantee himself a Ryder Cup debut.

How Sam Torrance would love a repeat now and, of course, for him to go one better.

Garcia, who chose not to return to Europe for the early summer swing that included the tour’s flagship Volvo PGA championship, is currently 16th on the table.

He is favourite, obviously, for a wild card, but as things stand Colin Montgomerie, Jesper Parnevik, Nick Faldo, Miguel Angel Jimenez and Bernhard Langer second at the weekend in Memphis, sixth in the Masters and third in the Players’ Championship - are outside the top 10 automatic places as well.

And Torrance has only two picks. Garcia’s manager Clark Jones is also Parnevik’s manager and there was good news from him today for Torrance going into an event which counts towards the Ryder Cup.

‘‘I think they could both be flexible (in their schedules),’’ said Jones. ‘‘They’re both communicating with Sam and I would not rule out any flexibility. That would be selfish.’’

Garcia said: ‘‘It would have been great if the Colonial and Memorial could have counted, but that’s the way they (the European tour) do it.

‘‘It probably puts a little more pressure on me, but it also encourages me more to try to get those points.

‘‘I really want to be there. Hopefully, I’ll get as many points as I can.’’

Woods himself was at Southern Hills before 6am today and had completed his first practice round with Mark O’Meara and Mark Calcavecchia just after 10am.

‘‘Five in a row would be very special,’’ he said. ‘‘But I’m not trying to win five, I’m trying to win one. What I have accomplished in the past does not hit any shots for me.

‘‘I’m not going to have an out-of-body experience. I have to hit the shots.’’

The steamy weather is already, appropriately, a hot topic of discussion.

But the good news for those who cannot stand it is that it may not be around all week.

For practice yesterday and today the temperatures were up in the nineties and the heat index, which includes the humidity, reached 100.

For the first two days of the tournament, however, there is a chance of showers and thunderstorms and it is expected to be no more than 90 degrees over the weekend.

‘‘A lot of people probably had a pre-conceived notion that Tulsa is incredibly hot in the summer,’’ said championship manager Robbie Zalzneck.

‘‘Once you get into August (when the 1994 US PGA won by Nick Price was staged at the course) it does get pretty hot, but on average June is not as bad.

‘‘It’s a little hot for people coming from out of town, but certainly the people of Oklahoma are used to this weather and this is a good place to conduct a championship.’’

Al Bush, general chairman of the event, added: ‘‘That rap about it being too hot to play is erroneous. They’ve had hotter US Opens in other places.’’

The most recent furnace was Oakmont in Pittsburgh in 1994, when Colin Montgomerie looked like a lobster as he lost the play-off with Ernie Els and Loren Roberts.

With the US Open keeping its tradition of an extra day for an 18-hole play-off, Montgomerie turned up on the Monday morning, to everybody’s amazement, wearing a dark tartan shirt.

His explanation was that it was the only one he had left.