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Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland walks up the 18th fairway on Sunday with his caddy J.P. Fitzgerald. David J. Phillip/AP/Press Association Images
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In the swing: McIlroy's caddy has many questions to answer

Now that the dust has settled on Sunday’s drama at Augusta National, Neil Cullen takes a look back at where it all went wrong for Rory McIlroy.

YOU’D HAVE TO feel sorry for Rory McIlroy. It was just awful to see him overcome by the pressure of leading a major with nine holes to play and become consumed by his desire to go for the miracle shot in a desperate attempt to get some sort of a finger-hold on the cliff of his eventual demise.

It was a cruel twist that we should watch the Northern Irishman implode in the exact same fashion as Dustin Johnson at last year’s US Open – the very meltdown that opened the door for victory for another Northern Irishman, Graeme McDowell.

While we thought little of Johnson’s final round 82 at Pebble Beach, each one of McIlroy’s wayward shots and missed putts were a crushing blow to our innocent hopes of seeing Rory end the day in a green jacket.

It’s just unfathomable what McIlroy must have been going through himself. Golf is a cruel, depraved game, made even worse by the fact that you only have yourself to blame and yourself to rely on to redeem the situation.

Imagine facing into the Col du Tourmalet in the Tour de France, your foot slips off the peddle half way up, you fall, your wheel buckles as a result of the impact and you’ve to wait for you’re team car minutes behind to change it. All of a sudden you’ve to face the most gruelling climb you could possibly imagine all on your own. That sounds horrific, but does it even compare?

The fact of the matter is, McIlroy was out there on his own and one has to question the role of the caddy in that situation. Let’s take an example. On the second hole on Sunday, his drive landed in a fairway bunker. Not a problem on a par five. You move the ball 100-150 yards back onto the fairway and you have a wedge into the green. 99 times in 100 a professional is putting a wedge within 10 feet. Great birdie chance, a par at worst.

The very thing you don’t do is take a risk and compound the original error as McIlroy did.

The same can be said for the 10th hole. Hitting it into someone’s garden was not the end of the world. The third shot was a cardinal error. In hindsight, a bogey five would not have been a bad score, and certainly would not have led to the complete capitulation which resulted in him missing a host of short putts.

A caddy’s job is not just about carrying the bag and working out the right yardage. The caddie must contribute to course management, shot selection, maintain the focus of the player, keep positive thoughts in the player’s mind and, most of all, be able to look at a situation objectively and see the percentages.

The future’s bright

The above makes for pretty grim reading, but there are some significant positives to take for Rory McIlroy. As he admitted himself, he can take solace in the fact that plenty of people before him have surrendered 54-hole leads in Majors and come back stronger, particularly Dustin Johnson who has already been mentioned, and Nick Watney.

Dustin Johnson is a player who has noticeably grown since Pebble Beach. Nick Watney has also come back a stronger player since throwing away a three-shot lead in the final round of last year’s USPGA with an 81. He showed great character in winning the WGC Cadillac Championship this year.

McIlroy will identify with those guys. He must also remember that one bad round doesn’t make you a bad player. He remains the most talented of all the so called “younger generation.”

He is also still only 21 and has never experienced such adversity on a golf course before in his life.

Tiger Woods was winning Majors from the get-go, but think of the adversity he had to face to even get there. He was black in a sport dominated by white men, many of whom didn’t even want to see him play golf. If succeeding in the face of that doesn’t make you mentally tough, nothing will.

Tiger’s performance this week shows why he still golf’s most prized asset. He kicked off the whole drama of the day with his performance on the front nine and there’s no doubt the biggest cheers of the day were when he was holing putts early in the round. His game may still be some way off where it was at his peak, but he remains the box-office draw.

A final word for the champion Charl Schwartzel. Luck was on his side early on as he chipped in for birdie on the first and held his second shot for eagle on the third. Both shots were extremely well played, but you could play both shots extremely well 100 times and you’d only hole them once.

Take nothing away from the performance though. To birdie the last four holes of a Major Championship on Sunday is certainly worthy of winning and a fitting end to what was one of the most exciting finales to a Major in living memory.

Read more of Neil Cullen’s columns for TheScore.ie here >

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