WHEN Colin Montgomerie just fails to win tournaments, as he has had
the misfortune to do eight times in less than 12 months, it is probably
no consolation to him to reflect on either the distinction of the
players who did win the events or that they had to score remarkably well
to beat him.
Last year Sandy Lyle twice had the better of his fellow Scot; the
Australian Peter O'Malley had to finish, eagle, birdie, birdie, birdie,
eagle, to thwart him for the Scottish Open title; and also in the final
round Jamie Spence shot 60 to deprive him of the Swiss Open.
Montgomerie's two other superiors in Europe were Anders Forsbrand and
David Feherty.
Of course, Montgomerie lost out, too, to Tom Kite in the US Open and
now has come his latest disappointment, finishing second to the Open
champion, Nick Faldo, in the Johnnie Walker Asian Classic. There was,
however, one positive benefit to come from his defeat in Singapore.
Montgomerie's #61,100 took his average earnings for his first two
tournaments of this year to #33,136 -- far in excess of the #8500
average he thinks he will need from 20 projected tournaments this season
to retain his Ryder Cup status. His average in 1991 was around #12,000
and some #14,000 last year.
By retaining third place on the team qualifying table Montgomerie is
securing his position so soundly that, as he said, he will be able to go
into his other tournaments in a more relaxed frame of mind. That could
even allow him to play in the Tartan Special championship at Dalmahoy.
No doubt it is worrying to Montgomerie that he cannot translate his
best efforts into winning. There is, however, no other prescription than
patience and as someone said: ''to learn how to win, you must first
learn how to lose.'' Preferably, however, not too often.
It simply is becoming as hard to win tournaments in Europe as it has
been for some time now in the United States. Few professionals anyway
have the dedication, discipline, and technical mastery of the game that
Faldo has above any of his contemporaries on the tournament scene. As
Montgomerie said at Singapore Island: ''All credit to him. He's always
under pressure as the No.1 player.''
And Faldo himself added: ''I wanted to beat the best when I started.
Now it's me that they all want to shoot at.'' Just now Faldo seems
almost to be bullet proof.
Indeed, Lord Macfarlane of Bearsden, the chairman of United
Distillers, felt obliged to remonstrate mildly with Faldo that, having
won the World Championship in Jamaica in December, he had plundered from
Johnnie Walker more than #460,000 within two months.
It will probably not be that way for very much longer, since Faldo
will be 36 in July and the stress and strain involved in competition,
travel, and trying to maintain his pre-eminence will tell sooner or
later.
The decline and struggles of Severiano Ballesteros, also to be 36 this
spring, is a case in point. Still, Montgomerie was ready to pay tribute
after Faldo had further strengthened his position at the head of the
Sony World Rankings and returned to the same position on the European
order of merit which he won last season. ''It's great to have the best
player in the world in Britain,'' Montgomerie said.
His respect for Faldo might well be translated into a Ryder Cup
partnership by the European team captain, Bernard Gallacher. Neither is
Faldo the easiest of players to find partners for, either in foursomes
or fourballs, and so Gallacher -- in the light of more up to date form,
of course -- might decide that they were made for each other.
* FALDO has taken only nine months to build an eight-point lead in the
Sony World Rankings, with seven victories in six countries. The
five-times ''major'' champion had four sub-par rounds in the Johnnie
Walker Classic in Singapore -- his second win in the event -- to
consolidate his No.1 position in the rankings. Top 10:
1, N Faldo (GB) 24.22pts; 2, F Couples (USA) 16.33; 3, I Woosnam (GB)
12.96; 4, J-M Olazabal (Spain) 12.87; 5, G Norman (Aus) 12.75; 6, B
Langer (Ger) 12.57; 7, N Price (Zim) 12.24; 8, D Love (USA) 12.01; 9, J
Cook (USA) 10.60; 10, T Kite (USA) 10.41.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article