A crucial element of Rory McIlroy’s stunning success this year has been the elimination of the kind of ruinous stretches that undermined his scoring in the early part of the season. McIlroy had cause to rue a return to that damaging old routine, then, as back-to-back double bogeys in the third round of the DP World Tour Championship left him with significant work to do on the final day.
McIlroy had just birdied the 10th and narrowly missed a chance at 11 when disaster struck. From a position as the joint leader, he three-putted the 12th before a poor tee shot and short-game bother at the par-three 13th triggered a five. The Northern Irishman reclaimed two of those shots over the closing stretch but, with 18 holes to play, trails the joint leaders, Henrik Stenson and Rafa Cabrera-Bello, by four.
By McIlroy’s own admission, he has to press hard on accelerator on Sunday. “I have to try to get off to a fast start,” McIlroy said after his second successive 70. “The same kind of start I got off to on Thursday. I have to put some pressure on and see what happens.
“I can’t afford to stay patient. I need to go out and get some birdies from the off and see where I can go from there. I need to be aggressive. I need to go at pins. I need to try and hit it close and hole some putts.”
This promises to be exciting stuff. McIlroy readily admitted two holes “ruined the scorecard”. He added: “If I didn’t have those, I would be right up there in the lead. It makes life a little bit more difficult but hopefully I can get that fast start and try to put pressure on the guys ahead of me.”
The main winners may be the European Tour. A thrilling finale to their final event of the season is highly likely with Victor Dubuisson, Marc Warren, Robert Karlsson, Joost Luiten and Thorbjorn Olesen lurking with leaderboard intent. Olesen double-bogeyed the 18th to slip to four shots from the summit, having played the front nine in a mere 31 shots. Warren followed up two 71s with a 65 to blast himself into contention.
Stenson’s success at this event last year means he stands out as the clear favourite from this position. He returned a 68, which proved three shots worse than Cabrera-Bello’s magnificent effort. Justin Rose lies third on his own, three shots worse off than the leading duo.
Stenson said: “This has been a good year but at the end, when we assess it, we will always look towards trophies. There hasn’t been any yet. A trophy would really make me go on my Christmas break with a positive feeling. It would mean a lot to me to get that win here and defend my title. We will try to make it happen but there are a lot of strong players out here. Rafa seems to be on fire.”
Rose, unlike Stenson, has two wins to his name this year. Like Stenson, the Englishman has previous for low scoring on the Earth course, including a Sunday 62 in 2012.
Rose’s challenge has rather gone under the radar this time, which will suit him just fine. He was effusive in his praise of Cabrera-Bello. “I watched an incredible round; Rafa Cabrera-Bello was unbelievable,” Rose said of his playing partner.
“He really struggled with his game the first few holes, up and down, up and down, up and down, and then got some flow going. He had 15 single putts. His short game was Seve-like. It was awesome, a masterclass.
“I feel the pins are one or two yards tighter that year than years past, so I’m not sure if there’s going to be a super low score to come. Sunday pins are traditionally a little trickier. From what I’ve seen this week, they are sick of us shooting 24-under around here, so they are trying to make the course show a little more teeth.”
