Open Observations

Mark McGowan at Royal Portrush

The morning may have lacked the stresses and emotions of the opening round of the 153rd Open Championship, but a lot happened on Friday at Royal Portrush.

The Slaughterer of Portrush

The action was sparked by the Butcher of Hoylake, Brian Harman, who showed up to Royal Portrush with his collection of knives well sharpened. Harman wasn’t the most popular winner amongst the Liverpudlians back in 2023 – and it wasn’t just for his love for hunting, slicing and dicing his food. He’d take great delight in being an unpopular winner again.

The ‘S’ word

Aussie Marc Leishman almost took the head off a spectator with a glorious shank off the 13th tee. He had to chip out sideways and then pitch onto the green with his third, eventually making what turned out to be a great bogey. After hitting a shank, it’s almost impossible to think of anything other than shanking it when you’re standing over your next iron shot, but Leishman managed to put it behind him in impressive fashion. He’s inside the top 25 going into the weekend.

That’ll Get-Er-Up

Last week’s Genesis Scottish Open winner and Rory McIlroy slayer Chris Gotterup played the three par-5s in five-under on his way to a six-under 65 and a place inside the top 10. The big-hitting American was on in two on the second and holed from 22 feet, was on in two on the seventh and two-putted for birdie, then was on the green in two again on 12 and this time had only eight feet for eagle. That’s how you make a big leap up the leaderboard.

Rory’s wise drop

After being a little wild when hitting the big stick off the tee in round one, Rory McIlroy’s first swipe with driver on day two saw him send his ball hurtling towards the out-of-bounds on the right, only for a fortuitously-placed clump of lengthy grass/rushes to come to his rescue. He then took a penalty drop from waist-high rough into knee-high rough and still managed to save par. Had he tried to hack his way out of the thicket he was in, God only knows what would’ve happened.

From hero to zero (-under)

Co-first-round-leader Jakob Skov Olesen would’ve been feeling pretty happy with himself when he went to bed on Thursday night but by the time he was three minutes into his second round, that smile had well and truly disappeared. That’s because Olesen drilled two balls out of bounds – one right, one left – off the first tee, and ultimately made an ‘eight’, dropping from -4 to level-par.

Norris chucks it away in one bunker

Olesen’s ‘eight’ wasn’t the worst score recorded all day though. That honour – or dishonour, perhaps – belongs to South African Shaun Norris. After building a little scar tissue by taking two to get out of one of the devilishly penal fairway bunkers on the fourth on day one, Norris tried to steer well clear on day two but overborrowed and hit it out of bounds down the right. Now in a ‘rock and a hard place-style dilemma, he must’ve decided that bunker was worse than reloading again and favoured the left side, and, you guessed it, found the bunker. I’ll hand over to Open Championship shot tracker to let you know what happened next.

Norris ended up making a sextuple-bogey-10 on that hole and missing the cut by four. He took six shots in that bunker alone.

A tough job

Somebody from the R&A Rules Panel drew the short straw and had to tell Shane Lowry that he was likely being assessed a penalty for his ball moving during a practice swing on the 12th. That had the 2019 champion looking over his shoulder at the cutline rather than looking ahead at the top of the leaderboard, and though he did enough under testing circumstances to ensure that he’d be around for the weekend regardless, it was a bitter pill for him to have to swallow and one that raises the question of whether slow-motion, zoomed-in television replays are an adequate way to determine something that needs to be visible to the naked eye.

Yeah, a lot happened at Royal Portrush on day two.

Oh, and Scottie Scheffler shot 64 to take a one-shot lead.