Sunday, 22 July 2012

Els Rolls Back The Years: How Ernie Won a Second Open

What a remarkable finish to The Open Championship.

For a long time it looked as though Australian Adam Scott was cruising to the 2012 edition of golf's longest running major and with it his maiden major championship.

However an almighty collapse in the final few holes let popular South African Ernie Els in to steal the claret jug from Scott.

Whilst the headlines will inevitably be about Scott's choke which was utterly remarkable, nothing should be taken away from Els's second Open victory and his fourth major victory overall.

Els began the day six shots behind Scott and went out in a disappointing two over par 34.

An immediate birdie on the 10th hole gave Els the impetus to kick on and when he holed a superb putt on the 18th to finish on -7, suddenly the pressure was on Scott.

And he choked big time. The Australian had led by four shots with four holes to play but bogeyed them all, including a missed 10 footer at the last to hand victory to Els.

Comparisons were instantly made with the epic collapses of Jean Van De Velde in The Open at Carnoustie in 1999 or Scott's childhood hero Greg Norman's meltdown at The Masters in 1996.

However, only Scott will know where and how it all went wrong. He undoubtedly has the talent to win Majors but it will take him a long time to get over this loss.

Let's focus on Ernie Els now though. You would be hard pushed to find a more popular man amongst the golfing public.

His speech at the end showed what a classy guy the 42 year old multiple major winner is.

Els's first thoughts were for his buddy Adam Scott. How many other golfers would have done that?

He also paid tribute to Nelson Mandela and the work he has done for South Africa over the last two decades. The man known as 'The Big Easy' has certainly done his fare share as well.

As for his golf on the course, his back nine was simply flawless. With the wind picking up and the pressure mounting, Els held his nerve to shoot an incredible 32 coming home.

It had been ten years since Els had won The Open in a play-off at Muirfield, but on the closing stretch this Sunday he had the look of a man who believed it was his time again.

He did require some help from Scott but he put in a lot of the groundwork himself.

Els showed their is life in the old dog yet and I wouldn't bet against him adding to his four Major titles.

Once again Open Sunday provided a bundle of dramatic viewing as it so often does.

Bring on Muirfield in 2013.

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