Tiger Woods ‘shouted’ at by furious rival in ’embarrassing’ golf course exchange

Tiger Woods inadvertently incurred the wrath of a golf rivals amid a mix-up during the final stages of a tournament before later being praised for his sportsmanship

Tiger Woods was on the wrong end of an mix-up with a rival, who shouted at the golfing great during the final stages of a tournament.

Back in 2012, during the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, the 15-time Major winner was mistaken for a marshal and felt the wrath of Robert Rock for failing to stand still while the eventual tournament winner prepared to play a shot. At the time, Woods, Rock and Rory McIlroy were vying for victory.

Reflecting on the incident, Rock recalled: “It was embarrassing. There were a couple of marshals who had gone off and were making quite a bit of noise.

So when I got ready to hit my iron shot and I heard the same thing, I just assumed it was the guy I was looking at. It was Tiger walking back and I shouted, ‘Stand still, please’. He was fine. But I shouldn’t have done that.”

Ranked 117th in the world at the time, Rock led by three shots after a birdie on the sixth, only to stumble with bogeys on the eighth and 13th holes as the tension rose.

With only five holes to go, the leaderboard was tight, with seven contenders within two shots of his score. Undeterred, Rock notched birdies on holes 14 and 16 and held his composure to secure the win – even after a perilous final hole where he was compelled to drop his ball perilously close to a lake’s edge.

He finished just one shot ahead of McIlroy at 13 under-par and two shots in front of Woods, who was tied with Thomas Bjorn and Graeme McDowell. Woods sportingly said: “Robert played great today. [A] Couple of [his] iron shots down the stretch there were just beautiful.”

Rock reminisced about the tournament via the Khaleej Times earlier this year. The now 47-year-old said: “I hit a super putt to the edge of the hole [on the 18th] and I was the champion having shot a final round 70.