delighted for the guy, that’s a fantastic win and a real up yours to all his proud countrymen who said he didn’t have it in him to win a major (if i was arsed searching for the thread where he was discussed/slated i’d put a link in here). Maybe this win will also give him the confidence to upgrade to a semi decent looking bird
Christ, I never thought he’d win a major but I doubt Harrington cares what I think/thought about his ability anyway so it’s hardly that big of an ‘up yours’ to the likes of me.
You almost sound emotional about it Jugs and it reminds me of the barman in my local who just loves Harrington. When he lost to Davis Love III in the World Matchplay by going into the water at the 18th back in January we started jeering him and he lost the head with us. It was quite funny now that I think about it.
I too am happy Harrington won but to say this puts pay to the argument of Harrington being a bottler is silly. He went into the water twice on the 18th after all. It was more others couldn’t take advantage of his mistakes.
Also delighted Garcia didn’t win. He seems a petulant fooker. I saw him being interviewed afterwards and he was bemoaning his luck and telling all the media how the saddest thing was that it wasn’t the first time he had to play against the field and the course. Poor Sergio. Muppet.
I was watching the Senior British Open earlier on Sky Sports. One of the commentators said that it was great to have a British winner of the Open last week at Carnoustie. He was later corrected by another commentator who said that “technically speaking” Harrington was not British as he was from the “Repubic of” Ireland. I don’t know which one of these two clowns is the worst. The one who thinks he is British or the one who thinks he is not British due to some kind of technicality.
I too am happy Harrington won but to say this puts pay to the argument of Harrington being a bottler is silly. He went into the water twice on the 18th after all. It was more others couldn’t take advantage of his mistakes.
Also delighted Garcia didn’t win. He seems a petulant fooker. I saw him being interviewed afterwards and he was bemoaning his luck and telling all the media how the saddest thing was that it wasn’t the first time he had to play against the field and the course. Poor Sergio. Muppet.
A bit harsh on Harrington there Pied. He won the major at the end of the day. He shot 4 under on the final day which is good going. The 18th hole is notoriously difficult - Van der Velde 1999 etc. The first shot into the water was understandable as he had the driver out. I genuinely think he was shaken by that which resulted in the second shot going into the water. He played an excellent third and did very well from there to hold for a double bogey. He also held himself really well in the play off. My point is that he won the major so ease off on the bottling jibes
As for Garcia, I didnt see those comments but they are shocking alright. I’ve always liked him as a player, but now I wonder why. Could it be that he is always smiling? For someone who was rated as being one of the very best around and does well in Ryder Cup matches etc, has he ever come close to winning a major apart from the Open?
[quote]I too am happy Harrington won but to say this puts pay to the argument of Harrington being a bottler is silly. He went into the water twice on the 18th after all. It was more others couldn’t take advantage of his mistakes.
Also delighted Garcia didn’t win. He seems a petulant fooker. I saw him being interviewed afterwards and he was bemoaning his luck and telling all the media how the saddest thing was that it wasn’t the first time he had to play against the field and the course. Poor Sergio. Muppet.
A bit harsh on Harrington there Pied. He won the major at the end of the day. He shot 4 under on the final day which is good going. The 18th hole is notoriously difficult - Van der Velde 1999 etc. The first shot into the water was understandable as he had the driver out. I genuinely think he was shaken by that which resulted in the second shot going into the water. He played an excellent third and did very well from there to hold for a double bogey. He also held himself really well in the play off. My point is that he won the major so ease off on the bottling jibes
As for Garcia, I didnt see those comments but they are shocking alright. I’ve always liked him as a player, but now I wonder why. Could it be that he is always smiling? For someone who was rated as being one of the very best around and does well in Ryder Cup matches etc, has he ever come close to winning a major apart from the Open?[/quote]
[quote]I too am happy Harrington won but to say this puts pay to the argument of Harrington being a bottler is silly. He went into the water twice on the 18th after all. It was more others couldn’t take advantage of his mistakes.
Also delighted Garcia didn’t win. He seems a petulant fooker. I saw him being interviewed afterwards and he was bemoaning his luck and telling all the media how the saddest thing was that it wasn’t the first time he had to play against the field and the course. Poor Sergio. Muppet.
A bit harsh on Harrington there Pied. He won the major at the end of the day. He shot 4 under on the final day which is good going. The 18th hole is notoriously difficult - Van der Velde 1999 etc. The first shot into the water was understandable as he had the driver out. I genuinely think he was shaken by that which resulted in the second shot going into the water. He played an excellent third and did very well from there to hold for a double bogey. He also held himself really well in the play off. My point is that he won the major so ease off on the bottling jibes
As for Garcia, I didnt see those comments but they are shocking alright. I’ve always liked him as a player, but now I wonder why. Could it be that he is always smiling? For someone who was rated as being one of the very best around and does well in Ryder Cup matches etc, has he ever come close to winning a major apart from the Open?[/quote]
I don’t think anyone is disputing that he was shaken by the ball going into the water - they’re just pointing out that those are the very traits of a bottler.
I was speaking to Harrington earlier on. He admitted that nerves affected his tee shot on the 18th. He also said Sergio tried to play mind games with him when they passed by each other (Sergio walking up the 17th fairway and Harrington going to retrieve his ball out of the water) by saying ‘So what brings you over here?’ Harrington said he ignored him.
He said the shot he was left with after dropping out of the water was far more difficult than the impression TV gave. It was 230 yards to the pin and there was a strong right to left crosswind with out of bounds on the left. It was also a blind shot in that you couldn’t see the water up ahead due to the course undulations so that adds to the difficulty. He said the way he shapes the ball in the air is to fade it so he was literally aiming for out of bounds while trying to cut it back and simultaneously hold it up against the effects of the crosswind. He said it was a severely difficult shot and it wasn’t a matter of ‘bottling’ that one, rather he didn’t execute it correctly.
He didn’t know it was in the water until he heard the crowd’s gasp and he thought he’d blown it. He gave great credit to his caddy for helping him to get his head clear for the chip and subsequent putt. He said the chip gave him unbelievable pleasure because of the text-book nature of the way he play it and the 5 foot downhill putt for double bogey was ‘inside left’ of the cup and even though he was very satisfied that he managed to recover and limit the damage to a 6 he thought he’d blown it for a brief moment on the green.
He said seeing his son run onto the green gave him an immediate boost and he thought, ‘I’m still going to win this.’ He said he thought Sergio played the last too conservatively by leaving himself 250 yards after taking an iron from the tee. He said if his 230 yarder was near impossible then Sergio’s 250 yarder, though from the middle of the fairway, was equally if not more difficult and he was mentally preparing for the playoff as he was in the scorers’ hut.
Once he knew it was a playoff his psychologist Bob Rotella spoke to him and told him to block every single thing out and for each shot of the playoff to singularly focus on one target in the distance and aim for that. So he got in this zone and he knew Sergio would be thinking about his missed putt for victory and wouldn’t be able to match his determined mindset.
Very interestingly he said that his drive on the first play off hole was about 30 yards shorter than in his earlier round because it had got cooler. As a result himself and his caddy decided to go one club extra with the approach and he stuck it to the pin and birdied. Sergio used the same club as earlier and was at least 1 club short and made bogey.
He said he wasn’t going to let it slip a second time after that.
A very friendly, affable guy.
Note to Jugs: People who didn’t think Harrington would win a major aren’t neccessarily less proud of being from Ireland than those who did.
I was speaking to Harrington earlier on. He admitted that nerves affected his tee shot on the 18th. He also said Sergio tried to play mind games with him when they passed by each other (Sergio walking up the 17th fairway and Harrington going to retrieve his ball out of the water) by saying ‘So what brings you over here?’ Harrington said he ignored him.
What a fookin dickhead. I don’t think he even looked at Harrington when he must’ve said that. Gutless. Play your own game. A coward and a bottler.
I was speaking to Harrington earlier on. He admitted that nerves affected his tee shot on the 18th. He also said Sergio tried to play mind games with him when they passed by each other (Sergio walking up the 17th fairway and Harrington going to retrieve his ball out of the water) by saying ‘So what brings you over here?’ Harrington said he ignored him.
What a fookin dickhead. I don’t think he even looked at Harrington when he must’ve said that. Gutless. Play your own game. A coward and a bottler.