Rory McIlroy must scale emotional mountain in search of home Open glory

The Northern Irishman has nothing left to prove, but still has to carry a vast weight of expectation at Royal Portrush

There was a lick of breeze riffling the long grass at Royal Portrush on Wednesday morning, and a lot of swirling talk besides. “Have you seen him?” “I heard he’s over by the putting green.” “He’s on the range.” “I heard he’s on the 1st now.” Round here everyone’s either looking for Rory McIlroy, looking at Rory McIlroy, or looking back on Rory McIlroy. A stretch of time watching him play is the one thing everyone wants to tick off during their day at the Open, along with a trip to the spectator village and a stop at the golf shop. You can track his progress around the grounds by keeping one ear open for the whispers.

Sometimes all this is wind at McIlroy’s back, others it seems to be blowing into his face. Last time the Open was here, in 2019, it threw him so far off course that he hooked his opening drive into the crowd and out of bounds, then hooked his provisional tee shot to the left, snagged his club on the rough, lost his ball for a moment, had to take a drop when he finally found it again because of an unplayable lie, and then missed his putt for triple bogey. His chances of winning a tournament for which he had spent four years preparing were good as done by the time he made it to the2nd tee. McIlroy being the man he is, he went out and scored 65 the very next day, and ended up missing the cut by one.

This week McIlroy was asked about his memories of it all. He was honest enough to admit that the home support got to him. “The walk to the 1st tee and then that ovation, I was still a little surprised, and a little taken aback, like: ‘Jeez, these people really want me to win.’ I think that brought its own sort of pressure and more internally from myself and not really wanting to let people down.”

Which is typical of McIlroy, the multimillionaire, multiple major winner who is still worrying about whether or not the folks back home are going to be disappointed with him. Like he has always said, the hardest part of his game is the bit he plays in his head.

You would think it ought to be different this time and not just because he is more used to it. It has been six years, and while that’s a short gap in the history of a tournament that goes back to 1860, it’s a long time in McIlroy’s life. The truth is that he has nothing left to prove now that he has completed the career grand slam by winning the Masters at last, 14 years after he blew that four-shot lead around the final nine holes. There are no asterisks by his achievements any more, no caveats, no quibbles, no what-ifs, no wondering when or whether ever. Everything he wins from now on is candy sprinkles on top of what he has already achieved.

McIlroy is already Northern Ireland’s greatest sportsperson, no doubt about it, and you won’t find one person in Portrush, or anywhere across the surrounding counties, who is anything other than delighted for him, whether he wins here or not. He has said that one of his new year’s resolutions was to have more fun and you’d think this week ought to be one long celebration of his achievements. There’s a friend on every swale, a smile on every supporter. But coming back home can be a complicated business. His great mate Graeme McDowell has already said on Sky Sports that he thinks McIlroy has got too much pressure on him to win this week.

“I think Rory is going to have too much emotion to deal with this week,” his fellow Northern Irishman said. “I still hope he competes but I think it’s going to be very difficult for him with the weight on his shoulders of all the emotion, and the weight of a country on his back.”

McIlroy’s putting coach Brad Faxon didn’t help much when he told the Golf Channel on Wednesday that McIlroy had hit the ball out of bounds on the 1st tee all over again two times already this week. “He hasn’t hit that fairway in his first two practice rounds.”

McIlroy, now 36, always seems to be fretting about something or other. In recent weeks he seems to have been busy worrying about exactly what he’ll do now he doesn’t really have to worry any more. He has decided that there are two things he really wants to achieve this season. One is winning this tournament, and the other is winning the Ryder Cup in September.

This championship hasn’t even started yet, and you already get the sense that somehow everything has already become more difficult than it ought to be for him given how much goodwill there is around the place. It is, as they say, a simple game made complicated by the people who play it.