Casey aims to make amends

Paul Casey’s last US Open ended with a round of 85 and accusations he pulled out of the event without giving a reason amid the worst slump of his career.

Twelve months on the 28-year-old Ryder Cup star approaches this week’s championship at Winged Foot in the best form of his life and relishing the chance to set the record straight.

When Casey withdrew before his second round at Pinehurst last year, he was a total of 46 over par for his last seven rounds of golf.

In stark contrast his last six tournaments on the European Tour in 2006 have produced finishes of 10th, fourth, fifth, fifth, second and 11th.

And not even an injury suffered when he stabbed himself in the hand with a pencil has dampened Casey’s enthusiasm for tackling the daunting test Winged Food is set to pose the world’s best.

“My game recently has been very consistent, which isn’t like me,” Casey told PA Sport. “I’ve always had my good rounds thrown in with my ’other’ rounds.

“The goal was to get into the top 50 in the world rankings and get into this and the Open so it’s been a successful period.

“I can’t be upset that I haven’t managed a win, I have to be excited about playing good consistent golf which I’ve never done before.

“It’s a good sign that I’ve been working on the right stuff. It’s felt quite ‘normal’ as well, it hasn’t been anything special. I haven’t thrown in a lot of low rounds, it’s just every round has been consistent.

“At the BMW Championship at Wentworth I was very tired on Sunday and it’s difficult to play the golf you want to play if you’re not physically and mentally fresh.

“It’s shown it’s difficult to play that many weeks in a row and if I’d played a week less maybe I could have turned one of those into a win.”

Casey came in for criticism last year when he withdrew, but is quick to point out he had informed officials of his back injury and that the USGA “have been very supportive”.

“I caught a bit of flak for that but my back was shot, the first round wasn’t pretty and I was advised not to play the second round,” added the five-time European Tour winner, yet to make a cut in three US Open appearances.

“I certainly didn’t want to get in the way of my playing partners and distract them in any way. I was advised not to play the second day and didn’t.

“I’ve had some shocking rounds of golf before, I had an 85 at the Open at St George’s in 2003 and went out the following day and put a pretty good round together (a 71) so that wasn’t an issue in terms of [being unwilling] to go out there and battle away. It wasn’t fair on my playing partners and I shouldn’t have been out there.

“The back injury got lost a bit and that was annoying. There was a lack of communication, championships like this are so big and you notify somebody and they don’t pass it on and it goes missing.

“But I’m excited about this week, this will be great. I like golf in this area and I love the style of golf courses up here.

“I was at the Century Club last week, which is just round the corner from here, and they were saying wonderful things about Winged Foot, how they thought it was possibly even the best course in the US.”

As for the injury he suffered to his right hand on Saturday, Casey explained: “After doing a photo shoot for Nike I was driving off in a buggy and waving and when I went to place my hand back on the steering wheel it caught the pencil.

“It’s still very sore but as long as it doesn’t split open I will be okay. I’ve superglued it together after cleaning it out! It’s not affecting the grip too much but when people shake hands it’s a problem.”