Rory McIlroy, Masters champion. Easy to write, hard to believe. Especially after a Sunday when drama rained down from the towering pines and an inspired Justin Rose threatened to ruin the coronation, only eventually submitting in a play-off.
Yet with three iron shots – on the 15th, 17th and on that first extra hole – that rank up there with the very best and bravest in the game’s annals, McIlroy claimed what for so long has been considered his birthright.
More than a decade after he had won his most recent major, the 35-year-old at last chalked up number five and so became just the sixth male player in history to complete the career grand slam – and the first European. Yes, Ben Hogan, Gene Sarazen, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods… you have a new member in your exclusive club.
Historic was one word to describe it. Another was exhausting. Thanks to his mistakes and the extraordinary indefatigability of Rose, the many admirers of McIlroy suffered a final two hours that stretched the credulity of this mad, mad sport to new absurdity.
McIlroy was five clear with eight holes left. And beat the 44-year-old Rose – who made an astonishing 10 birdies in his 66 – in sudden death with a birdie. With Rory, it was never going to be straightforward, was it?
“It feels incredible,” he said. “This is my 17th time here and I started to wonder if it would ever be my time. The last 10 years coming here with the burden of the grand slam on my shoulder and trying to achieve it… well, I wonder what we’re going to talk about going into next year? I’m absolutely honoured, thrilled and proud to be able to call myself a Masters champion. My dreams have been made today.”
Feel for Rose, because this was his third Masters runner-up placing and his second play-off defeat after being nudged out by Sergio Garcia in 2017. At the very least, this display will convince captain Luke Donald that he warrants a seventh Ryder Cup in September. But the upshot was that the gates of Augusta finally swung open for McIlroy, this Northern Irishman who always kept faith that they would and so, too, did those doors to immortality.
In 2019, Augusta National was in awe when Woods breached his 11-year gap between green jackets. This was McIlroy’s first time in the Butler Cabin. But it had been the same period back to McIlroy’s US PGA win in 2014 and that was appropriate. Because this felt just as big.
DeChambeau drops away
McIlroy went out with a two-shot advantage over Bryson DeChambeau and of course there was needle in the Georgia air. Ten months before, McIlroy was two clear of DeChambeau with five holes remaining in the US Open. There it was. The closure of the barren run.
Except, McIlroy missed a three-footer on the 16th and a four-footer on the 18th and watched in despair as ...
