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Royal Portrush
Half an hour into his opening round at Royal Portrush and Rory McIlroy had already hit a ball out of bounds, had already cracked Anna from Bangor's mobile phone screen with his wayward opening tee-shot, had already hoiked an approach shot into a bush before taking a penalty drop and holing out for a quadruple-bogey eight.
As he walked from first green to second tee the mood at Portrush changed. He had played one hole and already he was eight shots behind. It was 10.30am on what was supposed to be one of the biggest days of his professional career, spent in the bosom of his home country on a golf course he has only happy memories of, but how quickly it turned. From Portrush to eerie hush in 30 minutes.
All along the route of the second hole you could hear chatter from behind the ropes. "I don't believe this," said one of his supporters. "I've never seen anything like it," said another. "Nightmare," said a third. The masses had come to cheer him, not pity him, but what else could they do?
A missed tiddler on the 16th green cost him two more shots. A failed hack out of heavy rough on 18 and a wild approach to the green cost him three more. McIlroy has haemorrhaged shots in major championships in the past, he's had his mettle questioned, his ability to grind his way through difficult times put under the microscope, but the context here was everything.
