Vincent Hogan: 'Rory McIlroy seemed guilty of deepening the psychological challenge of chasing that career Grand Slam' Subscribe Latest Golf News:
The length of Tiger Woods's shadow obscured any other narrative rolling up out of Augusta on Sunday night, so frustration at another lost Major for Rory McIlroy never quite found compelling traction. Much like Rory himself over the four days, the appetite just wasn't quite there. His week finished on the ninth green, all the roars distant and, most probably, a little emptying. McIlroy, the pre-tournament favourite, was never a factor in the 83rd Masters, three rounds in the seventies rendering Sunday's closing 68 largely meaningless. Please log in or register with Independent.ie for free access to this article. Log In New to Independent.ie? Create an account Just a reminder of what he can do and, more pertinently, what might have been. Rory finished tied 21st, eight shots back on Woods and, truth to tell, never remotely close to working his way into contention. "My game is still there," he said afterwards, reminding us how he'd played the par fives in 11-under par for the week, a terrific stat, but bettered by big-hitters who were there to the end with Tiger like Tony Finau, Brooks Koepka, Xander Schauffele and Dustin Johnson. McIlroy's high error-count was the difference. Sixteen bogeys in four days reduced him to a footnote in this Masters, all that familiar pre-tournament talk of the career Grand Slam seeming ever so slightly tiresome now. Ill-conceived On Saturday, desperately needing a low score, McIlroy hit some awful, ill-conceived shots for a player of his calibre, his front nine lurching into a deeply frustrating mix of weak swings and bewilderingly bad decisions. He talked afterwards of "mud balls" making iron play difficult on a rain-softened course, but Finau covered that same, opening stretch in a six-under par 30 shots, just missing an eight-footer on the ninth to break Augusta's front-nine record. It's an accepted wisdom here that the course's real scoring opportunities present themselves once you step off the eleventh green. Yet Finau, Patrick Cantlay, Webb Simpson, Xander Schauffele and Rickie Fowler all made hay on Saturday's front nine. Rory, by contrast, reached the turn in two-over, 38 shots when - by his own estimation - he needed something closer to 33. He was out of position off the tee on two (par); essentially drove the green on three but took three shots to get down (par); inexplicably missed the sixth green left, despite a left pin position with everything falling from the right side (bogey); missed the seventh fairway left (bogey); missed the eighth fairway left (this time in trees) (par); flopped his approach to nine into a horrible bunker lie (bogey). It was scruffy, indifferent golf. Every time McIlroy looked like getting momentum, he'd instantly relinquish it. Interviewed on Sky afterwards, he observed - completely unsolicited - that he hadn't "read anything". As if the golf world was consumed by an idea that some loose media comment might have gotten under his skin and been responsible for another l
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