Garcia happy to ignore hecklers

Sergio Garcia, given a rough ride by fans at the last US Open in New York, is back looking for the big prize in the Big Apple this week.

The 24-year-old became a target for the rowdier element of the crowd at Bethpage two years ago after he made a gesture to them when he heard a comment from the galleries.

He said: “I never had a doubt about coming back.

“I’ve always loved New York and it’s been unbelievable to me. Right after Bethpage I came back to watch the US Open tennis at Flushing Meadows.

“I don’t think it really affected me that much that week. I tried to block it out a little bit.

“I think it was just a minority of of the whole crowd. I felt like a lot of people were behind me, just there was a little group that were a bit louder than the rest and you could hear them more.”

Garcia also encountered a heckler en route to winning in Texas last month.

“It was just a stupid comment,” he said. “Some guy just said ‘Sergio, you’re not going to win’. I didn’t even look at him. I was just trying to focus on what I was doing.”

He aims to do the same this week and, of course, at the Ryder Cup in Detroit in September.

Garcia was paired with Tiger Woods in the last group on the last day at Bethpage, but fell back to fourth with a 74.

“When you go to sleep and you have a dream, that’s exactly the dream you have, playing in the last group with Tiger,” Garcia said.

“Usually in dreams, you come out victorious. It would have been a great win.”

The week is also remembered for the fact that he apologised to Woods over an outburst when he suggested that play would have been suspended during a downpour if the world number one had been on the course at the time.

What the raucous spectators focused on was his repeated waggling of the club at address before he hits the ball, part of his pre-shot routine that thankfully he has consigned to history now.

With two US Tour wins in his last four starts, including a play-off victory over Padraig Harrington and South African Rory Sabbatini on Sunday, the Spaniard, back into the world’s top 10 as a result, is comfortable with the swing changes he has made and hoping his wait for a first major will soon be over.

And he also hopes he can achieve another of his career goals this season - topping the US money list. He is currently fifth.

A potential stumbling block there is that he has to play 11 European Tour-counting events to be eligible for the Ryder Cup.

He has played only two so far – the Accenture World Matchplay and the Masters, where he was fourth.

But after next month’s Open he is returning for the BMW International in Germany in August, the European Masters in Switzerland the following week and the American Express World Championship in Ireland in October.

There are also two events in Spain at the end of the season and, although playing those could theoretically rob him of the chance of the American Order of Merit, he said: “I think I have my chance with the schedule I have and if I don’t do it then I don’t deserve it.

“If you win the right events – majors and world championships – I think it is possible to be number one in America and Europe. Either that or you have to play a lot, but I don’t want to burn myself out.”

Harrington is the other main European hope of ending a barren spell in the US Open that stretches back to Tony Jacklin in 1970 and in all majors since Paul Lawrie’s 1999 Open win.

Justin Rose and Fredrik Jacobson, though, were both fifth on their debuts last year, Paul Casey was sixth in his first Masters two months ago and Darren Clarke’s two world championship victories make him a threat whenever he hits form.

Nineteen Europeans in all are taking part, including Nick Faldo, who at the age of 46 came through qualifying last week for another crack at a championship in which he lost a play-off to Curtis Strange in 1988.