PGA Championship an opportunity for Rory McIlroy to show his Major mettle

Ten years. A world ago. In the gathering gloom of a Sunday night in Louisville, Kentucky, 25-year-old Rory McIlroy lifted the Wanamaker Trophy at Valhalla Golf Club, his fourth career Major, and in truth nobody could have envisaged that the following decade would pass without the Northern Irish man adding to that total.

It is worth recalling what his peers then expected of the dominant world number one.

For one, Henrik Stenson. The Swede stood in the media mixed zone and told us of how McIlroy, in that time and place, had entered Tiger Woods territory. “It’s always hard to compare players,” admitted Stenson. “If he’s not the same, he’s not far behind. He’s got every opportunity to move on from here ... and if I told you that he were to win at least one Major in the next five or seven years, every year, you wouldn’t be surprised, would you? He’s got the opportunity to do that. It’s up to him.”

For another, Graeme McDowell. “It’s a case of how the guy continues to motivate himself. You don’t know what the number is. It’s however many he wants. He’ll win as many Majors as he wants, within reason.”

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Safe to say, the crystal ball readings didn’t come true. Not for the past 10 years at any rate. To the surprise of all, if the truth be told. For, in that moment in time, McIlroy truly was the heir apparent to Woods. He played the game with an air of invincibility, all parts working in perfect unison.

Yet, also that night, his coach Michael Bannon talked off the other side of McIlroy’s strength, his mental fortitude.

As Bannon, who remains by his side as the most trusted of swing coaches, put it back then: “The greatest thing is his bravery. This victory is so different from the first two [the US Open in 2011 and the US PGA in 2012]. In winning the Open and now a second PGA, he is showing this ability to hold on and be strong down the stretch and win. It just shows the mental strength he has.”

McIlroy has lived out those words of Bannon for much of the past 10 years, winning 24 tournaments worldwide — 16 of them on the PGA Tour, including three Tour Championships (and millions of greenbacks as a three-time FedEx Cup champion), and eight on the DP World Tour — but none of them in the one arena, that of the Majors, that matters most to him.

Certainly, for those of us in Kentucky that Sunday night, the drama — and sheer balls, if you will, of McIlroy getting officials to ask Phil Mickelson and Rickie Fowler in the penultimate pairing to stand aside on the 18th fairway so that he could get his tee shot away in near-darkness — was that of a man destined to reel off one Major win after another in the years ahead.

The scenes played out in that 18th hole drama saw McIlroy’s tee shot flirt with the water hazard, then up ahead Mickelson almost holed out his chip from the front of the green and, in the fading light, McIlroy then two-putted from more than 60ft for a par to close the deal.

In recent days, McIlroy recalled the audacity of bending the officials’ ears so that he could play that final tee shot.

“I’d say I’m a pretty, you know, nonconfrontational person. I’m not a huge fan of conflict, but when push comes to shove, I will. That was one of those times when I needed to sort of assert my will on a situation. I think if I wasn’t as, I guess, as pushy as I was, I would have had to sleep on that lead and on that tee shot overnight, I just did’t want to do that. I think the guys up ahead were pretty unhappy with how it all unfolded. I got the result that I was looking for in the end and that’s all that matters.”

McIlroy, now 35, returns to the US PGA Championship at Valhalla next Thursday still standing with four career Majors. But, rather than that fourth career Major — and, also, one that saw him claim back-to-back Majors in adding the Wanamaker to the Claret Jug he won at Royal Liverpool a month earlier — freeing the road for further additions to the trophy cabinet, it was as if he drove into a cul-de-sac that night which then blocked his way. No more Wanamakers, Claret Jugs or US Open trophies. No green jacket, most of all.

The route back to winning Majors has been full of twists and turns and speed bumps and dead ends. Since leaving Valhalla that night — in a Mercedes SUV that took him to the airport and a celebratory few days in New York before a transatlantic flight to parade the Claret Jug at Old Trafford — McIlroy has played in a further 35 Majors. There have been close calls in that time, for sure. Four top-fives, including a runner-up finish, in the Masters. Six top-10s, including a runner-up in the US Open. Six top-10s, including a runner-up in the Open. Two top-10s in the US PGA.

Some of those close calls were closer than others. Ultimately, though, the feeling of leaving empty-handed has been the overriding feeling for McIlroy in departing. Be that in Augusta National or St Andrews, Los Angeles Country Club or any of those iconic venues which have hosted Majors in the past decade.

Ten years on, Valhalla, again, offers McIlroy the latest chance to add to his Majors haul. A return to a happy hunting ground — and, in form, having won in New Orleans and in the thick of things at the Wells Fargo — could provide another run in the Majors that could yet yield the dividends he had set himself that night in Kentucky a decade ago.

On that night, McIlroy talked of new goals on his horizon. One, of course, was that quest — unrequited by Augusta so far — for the Masters to complete the Grand Slam. The other, though, was one that seemed only a matter of time for the box to be ticked, only to also prove equally elusive.

“[I want] to become the most successful European ever in the modern era. Nick Faldo has six. Seve [Ballesteros] has five,” said McIlroy. Of course, his gauge for such greatness was how many Majors each player had won. McIlroy remains stuck on four. Two behind Faldo. One behind Ballesteros. Who, least of all himself, could have thought he’d be stuck in neutral a decade on?

McIlroy in the Majors (since winning the PGA at Valhalla in 2014)

Masters: 4-10-7-5-21-5-MC-2-MC-22

PGA: 17-MC-22-50-8-33-49-8-7

US Open: 9-MC-MC-MC-9-8-7-5-2

The Open: DNP-5-4-2-MC-NT-46-3-6

MC: Missed Cut; DNP-Did Not Play; NT: No Tournament

Five to Watch at Valhalla

Brooks Koepka

World ranking: 37

Odds: 14-1

Koepka — a five-time Major champion — is one of those LIV players who seems to have benefited most from the more limited playing schedule on the start-up PIF-backed tour. His win at Oak Hill in Rochester, upstate New York, last year was impressive in how he fended off Scottie Scheffler and Viktor Hovland down the home stretch. He has been forced to live on limited rations as far as world ranking points are concerned but his recent win in LIV Singapore — his first since the birth of baby son Crew — showed life is good on and off the course.

Tommy Fleetwood

World ranking: 11

Odds: 40-1

Still chasing his breakthrough Major — and, indeed, still to win on the PGA Tour — there are positive signs that the English man’s game is ready to deliver. A third-place finish in the Masters last month only confirmed Fleetwood’s game is in a good place and he has sufficient experience in the Majors at this stage — he has top-five finishes in all four — to be ready and able should he get into contention in the final round.

Ludvig Åberg

World ranking: 6

Odds: 18-1

Where do you start? The 24-year-old Swede has made a sensational start to a professional career which only started last June. In less than a year, he has won twice — once on the PGA Tour (in the RSM Classic) and once on the DP World Tour (in the Omega European Masters) — but it was how he took to playing in the Majors for the first time, a runner-up finish behind Scottie Scheffler in the Masters last month, that only confirmed his class. A knee injury forced him to withdraw in advance of the Wells Fargo as a precaution.

Scottie Scheffler

World ranking: 1

Odds: 7-2

Well, those very tight betting odds are deserved given how the world number one has dominated men’s professional golf so far this season. His form line for the last five events — 1-1-2-1-1 — is akin to the old days of Tiger Woods’s invincibility. There’s no doubt that when Scheffler turns up, he has his A-Game (with the switch to the mallet putter improving his play on the greens). The only question about him is non-golf related, as he has put the clubs away in waiting for the birth of his first child.

Talor Gooch

World ranking: 644

Odds: 100-1

If only for sheer devilment, you have to take a look at how Talor Gooch plays on his return to the Majors. Gooch was the player of the year on the LIV circuit last year but has plummeted down the world rankings (with no OWGR points awarded on that start-up series). He has also been especially vocal in criticising his inability to get to play in the Majors. The PGA of the United States, however, has extended him a special invitation. His best result in the PGA was tied-20th in 2022.

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