WATSON CONFESSES THIS COULD BE HIS LAST ST ANDREWS OPEN
Published: 13th Jul 2010
LAST year's senior sensation at Turnberry Tom Watson insists his crucial missed putt at the 18th which cost him The Open is not something that haunts him.
Speaking in St Andrews yesterday before the first round of the 150th Anniversary Open Championship he said he had had some wonderful memories over the years. “That was a memory, I guess, in a positive sense, the way people responded to it. That's what I've taken from it.”
Joking about his “old age” the 60-year-old who finished one over on 73 today, said he could deal with the length off the tee at the much discussed Road Hole without any problem.
“I've finally figured out that the only way to play that hole is to lay up like Jack Nicklaus told me to 20 years ago, and I didn't follow his advice very closely a couple times.
“Fourteen is the hole that's going to create some problems, from the standpoint that when they move the tee back into an east wind, it's going to be very difficult for most of the field to carry Hell's Bunker. Now we'll be going into the 4th fairway over there, causing all kinds of delays coming in off the tee, like this, and from that standpoint it's going to make it play probably not the way they should play it. I just don't like the idea of trying to be able to hit a three-wood over there and trying to get up around the 14th green. That's a hard green to hit with any club in your hand, much less a three-wood.”
The five-times Open Champion reckons his form is not as good as it was last year.
“I'm putting pretty well, but my form, my ball-striking isn't quite where it was last year. I was very comfortable about the way I was hitting it last year. So we'll just see how it progresses this week.
“It was getting better yesterday (Tuesday) at the end of the practise round, so I feel pretty strongly that things will sort themselves out and I'll hit the ball reasonably well. I just hope that I can get into that 90 per cent feeling where I'm hitting nine out of 10 shots the way I want to rather than that 50 or 60 percentile, where I've been the last few days.
“That's where I am right now as far as the state of my game is concerned. I'm really looking forward to putting myself to the test at St Andrews once again. This is the seventh time I've played here in the Championship, and it might be my very last, at St Andrews, let's put it that way.”
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