New focus drives Dredge

A change of attitude worked instant wonders for Welsh World Cup winner Bradley Dredge on his 33rd birthday today as he took a share of the first round lead in the European Open at the K Club near Dublin.

After falling from third to 17th with a closing 75 at the French Open on Sunday Dredge had a heart-to-heart with his American coach Claude Harmon.

“He basically told me he was fed up with the way I was finishing things off and so after analysing it we decided I should try to be more aggressive,” said the Tredegar-born golfer.

“It’s new for me and we’ll see how it goes, but this was a good start. It seems to make me more positive.

“The best players are able to switch on and off on the course and I was thinking about that today. I was playing with two nice guys in Jean Van de Velde and Ricardo Gonzalez and we had a chat, but come the time to play I really tried to focus more.”

Sharing World Cup triumph with Stephen Dodd in Portugal last November is the obvious highlight of Dredge’s career so far.

But he is not happy with a record that shows only one tournament success in nearly 200 starts – in Madeira three years ago.

“I set my goals really high. Winning the World Cup was fantastic for me and Stephen and obviously for Wales as well, but I want to win individual titles.”

Considering what he wants to achieve it might seem strange to some that Dredge has not tried to qualify for the US Open in the last two years.

He missed out on an exempt spot by one place by finishing 16th on last season’s Order of Merit, but stated: “The way I look at it the chances of me doing well there are quite slim, to be honest.

“I’ve never played it before and the course is set up so differently. I wanted to be fresh now. I wanted to target these events. Everybody’s different.

“There are big, big prizes the next few weeks and if you play well you can do some damage on the Ryder Cup points board.”

He is 23rd in the standings at present, but like John Bickerton did by winning the French Open he could move to 10th with victory on Sunday.

Dredge was only two under after 11 holes, but then birdied the next four and two-putted the par five last to join Swede Niclas Fasth out in front.