Rory McIlroy won the opening skirmish of his much anticipated battle with Jordan Spieth by two shots in his first competitive outing of the year at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship on Thursday. “I got a bad “monitoring” time on my putt on the eighth [17th] after they had taken us off the clock and the guys behind us hadn’t even reached the fairway”, Spieth said. Spieth admits a deliberate approach but believed he was perfectly entitled to be so, with no group waiting to play from the 8th fairway.
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Left facing a £2,000 fine if he is pulled up again, the American was understandably
baffled, though, in keeping with his conduct since becoming the game’s new superstar with his two major wins last season, he neither created a scene after being confronted by Paramor nor went over the top with his comments on the matter afterwards.
On the fourth tee (their 13th hole), the group was informed it was being monitored. “It didn’t affect the round, but Rory and Rickie were surprised as well”.
The PGA Tour’s number one ranked player Jordan Spieth is in the Middle East for the first time in his career this week.
The European Tour’s tournament committee unanimously voted in favour of the proposal that was put forward by Darren Clarke at last week’s EurAsia Cup in Kuala Lumpur. “It’s not like Jordan is a slow player”. Any player who then exceeds the time permitted to play a shot – 50 seconds if first to play and 40 seconds thereafter – will be issued a “monitoring penalty”.
Spieth said he was excited about the pairing with McIlroy and Fowler. Sometimes we need to apply some common sense, especially when we are not out of position. “You’ve got people out there like Einstein, George Washington – they just stood out and capitalized on their differences and showed the world a little different side”.
With starting times of 12.05 and 12.15 on Friday, the star groups will be sure of packed galleries as Abu Dhabi enters the first day of its weekend. The incident threatened to overshadow a glorious morning in which McIlroy delivered, in Spieth’s words, “a masterclass” with a 66.
“I didn’t drive the ball well, which is really the key out here, so to shoot four-under with the way I felt with my driver is spectacular”, he said.
This unseemly business rather deflected from a terrific McIlroy start to the year.
“I just made sure it didn’t affect my round”, said Spieth. “It was the Rory I have seen win major championships”. “I came home from Hawaii, took a couple days off, went and saw my instructor, and I actually feel better about the way I’m striking my irons coming into this week than I did going into Hawaii”.
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“They are all the same length, same lie angle, same shaft, just different loft”, explained DeChambeau, who is set to turn professional after playing in the Masters in April.
