McIlroy on a journey to rediscover his old self

At various moments after teeing off with world No. 2 Collin Morikawa in the opening round of the Hero World Challenge where he took the joint lead, Rory McIlroy wore a wide smile, acknowledging a handful of claps. Far cry from last month, when he ripped his shirt in fury after a poor finish in the final round of the DP World Tour Championship. Also from a couple of months before that, when he broke down during an interview for not living up to his team’s expectations in Team Europe’s crushing Ryder Cup defeat.

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The range of emotions mirrored McIlroy’s year on the course. He won the Wells Fargo Championship in May 2021 for his first victory since 2019 and the CJ Cup in October for his 20th career PGA Tour title. Around that, however, were bumps and breaks in the current 8th-ranked player’s quest to reach the top again, a perch that was his last year when McIlroy was world No. 1. Then the pandemic struck, and McIlroy plummeted to outside the top 15 of the rankings earlier this year for the first time since 2009.

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“Yeah, there's been a few ups and downs,” McIlroy said in a media interaction here. “I think it's been a year where I've struggled in parts, but I still got two wins on Tour. I played well in parts, I just didn't do it consistently enough.

“Obviously, there was a stretch during the year where I didn't feel like I was playing my best and went on a different path in terms of looking for answers and came down that road, came back up that road and learned some things. I feel like I'm certainly a wiser player than I was maybe nine months ago,” he said.

The CJ Cup victory in Las Vegas followed right after by the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai where he began the final round with a one-stroke lead showed what McIlroy can do when on song. The key to finding the right notes, the 32-year-old realised, was rediscovering his old self. Perhaps why he chose to reunite with his childhood swing coach Michael Bannon last month.

The Manchester United parallel

Explaining that thought, McIlroy drew parallels between his game and his favourite football club’s recent struggles. “Manchester United over the last few games have looked like not really having a strategy or a philosophy of how they want to play. It felt like that was me for a few months of this season,” the Irishman said. “Now I feel like I've regained what my philosophy is; basically the sort of golf that I want to play.”

Which is more imaginative, more creative. “Just not being a perfectionist, I guess,” McIlroy said. “Being okay that you're going to miss shots here and there.”

There was one huge miss in the final round of the DP World Tour Championship last month. Sharing the lead with Morikawa, McIlroy’s chip on the green at the 15th hole hit the flagstick with the ball rebounding into the bunker. McIlroy stood there with an expression of disbelief, and subsequently bogeyed thrice in his final four holes to settle for a tied-sixth finish while Morikawa took care of his business. McIlroy was then pictured standing in the scoring area with a torn shirt, the unravelling post the bad break still playing in his mind.

Days later and miles away from Dubai, the ripped shirt is still in fashion in Nassau. Asked about it for the second time during the press conference here, McIlroy retorted: “I went to the pro shop, bought a new one, threw that one in the trash. I mean, this f****** ripped shirt, Jesus.”

Minutes earlier, he offered a more detailed insight into his unusual outburst. “What I was angry about was how I reacted to the bad break, not the bad break or the fact I didn't win the golf tournament, because Collin played great,” McIlroy said. “It was just my reaction to that bad break that made me angry because I basically lost my head after that.”

What he isn’t losing sleep on, however, is the Major draught. The last time McIlroy won one was way back in 2014 at the PGA Championship at Valhalla, when he became only the fourth player in the last century to win four Majors at 25 or younger. It’s been a while, but McIlroy believes with his game feeling a lot better now than at the start of the year, he is walking the right path of trying to place himself in that position again.

“Since winning my last Major, I've done everything but win a Major—The Players Championship, two FedEx Cups,” he said. “If I keep playing the way I'm playing, I just keep giving myself chances, it will eventually happen again.”

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