World No 1 Jon Rahm might consider Rory McIlroy’s A-game “a thing of beauty”, but he still reckons he’s unbeatable when playing his best golf.

McIlroy, Rahm and Masters champion Scottie Scheffler have shared the world No 1 ranking over the past 19 months, but while there is some debate over who is better when firing on all cylinders, Rahm has no doubts.

Asked if anyone can beat him when playing his best, Rahm said “no” ahead of the $20 million (€19m) Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill, where McIlroy, Shane Lowry and Pádraig Harrington are joined by every member of the world’s top 20 bar Cameron Smith, though he admitted his rivals likely feel the same.

“You don’t need to be firing on all cylinders to win. I had a conversation similar to this with Tiger. I asked him, out of the 82 wins on the PGA Tour, I didn’t get into the other ones, how many times do you think you played your best all four days? And he said three at most. Right? A lot of those Sundays, he played his best, but the whole week, very few.”

​While he admires Scheffler and McIlroy, who could replace him as world No 1 with a win this week, Masters favourite Rahm does not feel the need to change anything for Augusta after winning in five of his last nine starts.

“Clearly, what I’m doing right now works, so there’s no reason to emphasise anything just because it’s Augusta National,” he said.

Meanwhile, tickets are now on sale for the KPMG Women’s Irish Open at Dromoland Castle from August 31 to September 3. Leona Maguire, the big home draw in Co Clare, tees it up in the HSBC Women’s World Championship in Singapore tomorrow as Olivia Mehaffey goes today in the LET’s Joburg Ladies Open at Modderfontein.

And County Sligo GC is expecting a bumper entry for the 100th-anniversary staging of the Connolly Motor Group-sponsored West of Ireland Amateur Open from April 7-11. The event will boast a new format with three rounds of strokeplay qualifying before  the leading 16 players then face  off in match play.