Rory McIlroy joined a who’s who of stars in failing to make the cut at the Open and claimed “the wind got the better of me” as he departed Royal Troon.
Bryson DeChambeau, Tiger Woods, Cameron Smith, Viktor Hovland, Tommy Fleetwood, the 2023 US Open champion Wyndham Clark and a clearly furious Tyrrell Hatton were among the names to join the world No 2 in missing out on the weekend. The cut was at six over par.
McIlroy dropped six shots in the first six holes of his second round, effectively setting the seal on his championship after a dismal score of 78 on the opening day. A stronger back nine at least gave the 2014 Open champion something to smile about, but after his collapse at the US Open last month, he will be hoping the Olympics can provide a change of mood after a summer to forget.
“The wind got the better of me the last two days here”, McIlroy said. “I didn’t adapt well at all to that left-right wind on the back nine yesterday and then this afternoon going out in that gusty wind on the front, I felt pretty uncomfortable over a few shots.
“I obviously got off to the worst start possible today being six down through six”, he added. “It was like that was it, 22 holes into the event and I’m thinking about where I’m going on vacation next week. But then I played the last 12 holes pretty well, bogey free.
1 Shane Lowry (Ire) -7
T2 Daniel Brown (Eng), Justin Rose (Eng) -5
T4 Billy Horschel (US), Dean Burmester (SA) -2, Scottie Scheffler (US) -2
T7 Corey Conners (Can), Jason Day (Aus), Xander Schauffele (US), Patrick Cantlay (US) -1
T11 Matthew Jordan (Eng), Joaquin Niemann (Chi) Par
T13 Dustin Johnson (US), Brooks Koepka (US), Collin Morikawa (US), Mackenzie Hughes (Can), Jon Rahm (Sp) +1
Missed cut (selected players)
Keegan Bradley (US) +7; Henrik Stenson (Swe), Tyrrell Hatton (Eng), Louis Oosthuizen (SA) all +8; Ludvig Åberg (Swe), Bryson DeChambeau (US), Francesco Molinari (It), Tommy Fleetwood (Eng), Zach Johnson (US) all +9; Tony Finau (US), Viktor Hovland (Nor) both +10; Rory McIlroy (NI) +11; Cameron Smith (Aus) +12; Tiger Woods (US), Sahith Theegala (US) both +14; Wyndham Clark (US) +16.
“I think when the wind died down a little bit, or at least manageable for me, I started to play better. But if you haven’t played in wind like that for quite a while, sometimes it’s just hard to adapt.”
While DeChambeau was spotted shaking his head in befuddlement after he posted a second round of 75 to end nine over for his tournament, and Hatton was shouting angrily at his perceived failings (and of those watching on), spare a thought for Japan’s Aguri Iwasaki who recorded an astonishing second round score of 91 to finish 154th on the leaderboard and 23 over par.
There were some good news stories however: the American Max Homa clawed his way into the weekend, securing his place in the top 80 players with a birdie at the 18th; Scottish Open champion Bob MacIntyre recovered from dropping eight shots in his first four holes to finish with a 32 on the back nine, a score of 75 and a place in the final two rounds.
