“I don’t think playing the Masters was something you would dream about,” the 29-year-old said as he made his final preparations for the week of a lifetime. “It’s too far-fetched even to dream about, but it’s obviously just going to be a great week and something to enjoy and remember forever.”

Thanks to his win over Irish team-mate Hugh Foley in last year’s US Mid-Amateur Championship at Erin Hills in Wisconsin, McClean is also set for June’s US Open at the Los Angeles Country Club. But even with two Majors on his schedule this year, the Malone Golf Club man admits making the Great Britain and Ireland team for September’s Walker Cup over the Old Course at St Andrews is the big goal this year.

Most amateurs teeing it up in the Masters are contemplating a career in the professional ranks, but after the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted the plans of a host of young players, this affable Ulsterman will remain amateur to make sure he’s eligible for that Walker Cup before potentially having a crack at the DP World Tour Qualifying School in September.

It’s all a far cry from his early days playing soccer and Gaelic football and his first tentative steps into the world of golf at Balmoral Golf Club, where Ireland’s first Major winner, Fred Daly, was attached as head professional for the last 45 years of his life.

McClean reckons he was 10 or 11 when he first took up the game under the watchful eye of his father, Noel. But he didn’t start to take it seriously until he was 16 and with Malone professional Michael McGee his lifelong coach, he’s gradually become one of Europe’s top amateurs.

Until he won the US Mid-Amateur title, a USGA event limited to players aged 25 or over, he was best known in Irish golfing circles for his near misses.

But as Pádraig Harrington has often said, you have to keep putting your neck on the block to learn how to win and McClean finally got rewarded for his remarkable consistency last year with victory in the US Mid-Amateur.

​As he said before the AIG Irish Amateur Close last year, where he lost to Foley in the semi-finals, he feels like a contender every time he tees it up these days.

“I’ve got my game to a level where I have the attitude that I can win anything I play in this year,” he says. “It’s that attitude that’s the biggest factor when it comes to winning. I probably haven’t had that feeling any other year until this year, so I’ve just got to keep on trying and hopefully, that confidence continues, and I get over the line.”

A beautiful ball striker, he was runner-up to John Murphy in the Mullingar Scratch Trophy in 2018 but made his debut for Ireland in the R&A Men’s Home Internationals at Lahinch in 2019, then went on to help Ireland win that title at Hankley Common in England in 2021.

Last year, he was a quarter-finalist at the West of Ireland, sixth in the Lytham Trophy, runner-up in the Flogas Irish Men’s Amateur Open Strokeplay, where he was beaten in a play-off, third in the Brabazon Trophy and runner-up to fast-finishing Foley in the North of Ireland at Royal Portrush.

He would go on to make the Great Britain and Ireland team that beat Continental Europe in the St Andrews Trophy in Slovakia and then follow that semi-final loss to Foley in the ‘Close’ at Headfort with a 3&1 win over the Royal Dublin man in the 36-hole US Mid-Amateur final.

The Masters has been on his mind ever since, but his play remains impressive, as he showed by following an eighth-place finish in the South African Stroke Play Championship with a run to the semi-finals in the South African Amateur Championship earlier this year.

Before that trip, he managed to play two practice rounds at Augusta National with Foley in January and while the course was long and soft again when he played it twice more two weeks ago, he’s now birdied 10 of the 18 holes and feels he knows how to get it around.

“I’m just looking forward to getting there on the Monday, playing nine holes in front of the crowds and just trying to get a bit more relaxed,” says McClean, who had to think for a moment before confirming he’s already birdied the second, fourth, sixth, seventh, eighth, 10th, 12th, 13th, 15th and 18th.

“I think a lot of the time with golf, it’s the thoughts about it that are far worse than reality,” he explains. “So it’s just getting onto a tee box, hitting a good shot, and realising that it’s still golf at the end of the day.

“From a scoring point of view, there’s no doubt it was probably one of the hardest golf courses I’ve ever played.

​“You’ve got to drive the ball really well, hit good iron shots into the right place and have a really good short game. That’s the thing with Augusta, the most complete game wins. You can’t have a weak point. It tells you quite clearly what shot you have to play and you’ve just got to try to play it.”

A 300-yard hitter, he’s now been up and down Magnolia Lane several times, felt the swirling winds at Amen Corner and even plotted his way around in one-under par in one of his most recent practice rounds despite hitting a plethora of hybrids and fairway woods into the longer par-fours from rain-softened fairways.

“Obviously, it will be a completely different ball game when you tee it up on Thursday with 5,000 people watching,” adds McClean, who will have close friend Stephen Gracey (a three-handicapper) on his bag and a host of friends and family set to share a rented house for the week, even though he plans to sleep in the Crow’s Nest this evening after attending the Amateur Dinner.

“You don’t know how it’s going to go until you basically go for it. I’m just looking forward to getting in there, getting the atmosphere and the buzz going and just sort of giving it a go really.”