Rory McIlroy has given his chances of arriving on home soil as the reigning Genesis Scottish Open champion a considerable boost with a five-under 65 that has him provisionally inside the top five at The Renaissance Club in North Berwick.
The world number two finished with three birdies to get himself into red figures at -2 on day one, and he carried that momentum into round two where he found the conditions very much in the favour of low scoring in the early stages.
“I got off to a bit of a flyer,” McIlroy said afterwards, having birdied five of his first seven holes to briefly hit top spot on the leaderboard. “The conditions were so benign this morning, hardly any wind. And the wind started to pick up a little bit on the back nine for us but still very, very manageable. I started to struggle a little bit. Hit a couple of wayward drives but did well to scramble for pars. Yeah, and disappointing to drop one coming in there but overall it’s a really good score and puts me right into the thick of things going into the weekend.”
After a rather abject spell of golf following his career-crowning victory at Augusta National back in April, the Open Championship at Royal Portrush was always going to get the competitive juices flowing again and while the Scottish Open is a preparation week first and foremost, he feels that his game is rounding into shape nicely. And he’s hoping to test it under pressure over the weekend.
“Most of it,” he responded when asked if he felt that he’d shed the rust he was battling in the early stages of round one.
“As I said there’s still a few loose shots in there but for the most part it was a good day. I held a lot of putts. I did most things pretty well. So yeah it was a good day for that and as I said, getting into contention and then seeing how your game holds up when you’re in the thick of things, trying to win a golf tournament, I think that tells you a lot more about where you are than just the first two days of a tournament.”
The wind picked up a little over the course of McIlroy’s round and continued to do so over the hours following, and he’s hoping that the sunshine remains over the closing round, even if there’s the potential to play in vastly different conditions next week in Portrush.
“Probably a club wind at the minute, which is really nice,” he said. “I’d love the weather to be like this over the weekend. I think everyone would.
“But I would imagine that the breeze is going to get up a little bit this afternoon and I can see the flags blowing a touch more now. It was certainly benign for us this morning the first nine holes. There was literally zero wind. There’s a little breeze getting up but I expect that.”
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