Rory McIlroy hopes remedial work with coach Pete Cowen will pay off in the Scottish Open as he battles to get his long game in shape for The Open.
The world No 11 put in a rusty performance in last week’s Dubai Duty Free Irish Open, hitting just three fairways over the weekend as he finished tied 59th, 17 shots behind Lucas Herbert.
“I’m looking forward to getting back on the golf course,” McIlroy said at the Renaissance Club. “I was pretty rusty last week in Ireland. I didn’t really do any practice the week after the US Open, and it sort of showed in my game.
“So it’s been nice to link back up with Pete, who is here and work on some stuff the last couple of days. The great thing about Pete is he doesn’t sugarcoat it. He’ll tell me when it’s not great so that when he does give me a compliment, I know that it’s real. It’s been great.”
As for his long game, he said: “You can get away with it with the shorter clubs, but once you get a longer club in your hand, that’s where some of the bad habits start to creep in a little bit more.
“That’s something that I’ve worked on, and it feels better. I definitely drove the ball much better yesterday for nine holes and then today in the pro-am, as well, so that was encouraging.
“Good thing about Pete is he’s been doing it such a long time and with so many great players, is he knows what works and he knows what doesn’t.”
Pádraig Harrington will be at Sandwich with McIlroy, Shane Lowry and Darren Clarke. But it’s the last chance saloon for Graeme McDowell, Cormac Sharvin and Jonny Caldwell as they bid to win Open exemptions for the first three, not already exempt, who make the cut.
Séamus Power will also have a chance to qualify for his first Major if he’s the leading non-exempt player finishing in the top five and ties at the John Deere Classic in Ohio.
On the PGA Tour Champions, 2011 Open champion Clarke will warm up for his return to Sandwich by chasing his first senior Major in the US Senior Open at Omaha Country Club. The 52-year-old is aiming to become the first non-American winner since Colin Montgomerie in 2014.
On the LPGA Tour, world No 61 Leona Maguire returns to action with Stephanie Meadow in the Marathon LPGA Classic in Ohio.
In amateur golf, Ireland finished second, 10 shots behind Scotland on 18-over in 36-hole qualifying for the European Ladies’ Team Championship at Royal County Down and will face Italy in Flight A today for a place in the semi-finals.
Lahinch’s Aine Donegan (71-74) tied for fifth on one-under 145, eight shots behind Scotland’s Hannah Darling (68-69) with Beth Coulter (74-75) tied 12th, Lauren Walsh (78-72) and Sara Byrne (77-73) tied 19th, Annabel Wilson (79-76) joint 48th and Anna Foster (81-76) 65th.
Scotland face Spain, the Czech Republic meet England and Sweden take on Denmark in the other quarter-finals.
However, it was a bitterly disappointing day for Ireland in the European Team Championships at PGA Catalunya as they finished 13th and last in the race to make the top eight who qualified for Flight A, 35 shots behind leading qualifiers Spain.
Mark Power (75-69), Caolan Rafferty (74-71), Hugh Foley (73-72), Robert Moran (74-73), Marc Boucher (71-77) and Matthew McClean (76-76) finished well adrift of Spain’s Eugenio López-Chacarra (67-66).
Ireland will now face Iceland in the Flight B semi-finals as the hosts meet Austria, France play the Netherlands, Germany take on Belgium and Sweden face Denmark.
John Deere Classic, Sky Sports Golf (8pm)
Scottish Open, Sky Sports Golf (8am)
US Senior Open, Sky Sports Golf (6.30pm)
Aramco Team Series, Sky Sports Mix (1.30pm)