Nightmare hole fails to dampen Monty's spirits

Colin Montgomerie took five shots to move his ball a few feet today – but still managed to leave Le Golf National near Paris feeling much better about his game going into tomorrow’s tough Open Championship qualifier at Sunningdale.

Montgomerie ran up a quadruple bogey nine on the ninth hole of his final round in the French Open, yet either side of that produced seven birdies for a one over par 72.

He ended well down the field on 10 over par, but was focusing on the positives before he headed for home in his car.

“That’s my best since my different life,” said the Scot, referring to his marriage break-up two months ago and pointing out that today was his wedding anniversary.

The 596-yard ninth hole has ruined many cards this week, but Montgomerie did not expect to be added to the list of victims when he hit his second shot just five yards from the green.

It was in rough so deep, though, that in repeatedly thrashing at it the ball moved only a few inches each time.

It meant an outward 40, but the seven-time European number one, outside the top 20 in both the Order of Merit and Ryder Cup race, then came home in 32.

At Sunningdale, he is part of a 120-strong field including three major winners in Bernhard Langer, Jose Maria Olazabal and Ian Woosnam and more than 50 tournament winners. They are fighting it out over 36 holes for just 15 places at Royal Troon – Montgomerie’s home course.

Justin Rose is also involved and he goes there having finished 15 over par in his last two tournaments.

The 23-year-old missed the cut in last week’s US Open and had a closing 76 at Le Golf National.

“A bit of a waste of time – very stressful for not much reward,” he said. “I’ll just try to get it out of my system quickly and change my mindset for tomorrow. Bogeys will no good there.”

Missing the Open would put a serious dent in his Ryder Cup chances and on that he commented: “Of course it’s important to me, but it’s not the be-all and end-all of the year.

“I’m just trying to play as well as I can. But I haven’t done a very good job these last two weeks.”