As Rory McIlroy clamped down on his bottom lip, his little white ball hurtling towards the water, a gasp could be heard around the Dubai desert. The rough acted as a bumper to ensure a “lucky” McIlroy, haunted by last year’s splash on the 18th hole, would eventually escape with victory over rival Patrick Reed despite flirting with danger once more.
This most absorbing of final rounds on the DP World Tour underlined that magnetic force that binds McIlroy and gripping drama. A three-shot lead whittled down by Reed added a fascinating narrative following ‘teegate’. But the shaky edge to a 15th victory on the European circuit, his third at this particular event, while denying Reed, only gave him more pleasure.
On another day, McIlroy may have captured his scintillating best and stormed home, but a gentle start, including eight successive pars, made for a pulsating watch. Golf’s villain, who sniffed victory after emerging as the outright leader with three holes to play, having started the day four behind, could be seen confidently soaking in McIlroy’s finish from the scoring office, beads of sweat trickling down the former Masters champion’s face.
One of the sport’s most controversial characters, Reed went from clasping binoculars on Sunday in order to identify his ball inside a palm tree, to a majestic run of holes that gave McIlroy a real fright.
The anguish painted across McIlroy’s face on 18, beautifully revealing just like his uncomfortable, yet brutally honest expression when pushed on a potential truce with Reed, added humour after what started, in the words of the four-time major winner, as a “storm in a tea cup”.
Tantalisingly close to sharing the fairway together, Reed relished the chance to land counter blows from the group ahead, as momentum swung with each of his six birdies and one eagle. McIlroy even pestered Sky Sports’ Wayne Riley for updates on his rival, eager to tweak his strategy and contain his desire to uncork his immense power from the tee.
Reed’s greed on 17, attempting to reach the 343-yard par four in one, looked to have scuppered a famous comeback, but a nerveless par putt shifted the pressure back once again to McIlroy to keep his hopes alive.
And once McIlroy escaped the water on 18 and the demons from last year’s capitulation on the same hole that gifted Viktor Hovland the title, the 33-year-old displayed immense maturity to lay up and then slide the decisive birdie putt right into the middle of the cup, finishing at -19 after a four-under-par final round of 68.
“Mentally today was one of the toughest rounds I’ve ever had to play,” a brutally honest McIlroy conceded. “It would be easy to let the emotions get in the way.
“I had to concentrate on myself, forget who was up there on the leaderboard, I showed a lot of mental strength out there.
“This is probably sweeter than it should be or needs to be, but it’s a great start to the year.”
Part of the joy with McIlroy is his candid nature, unafraid to reveal his disdain for Reed and those who made the leap to the Saudi league.
An innocuous moment, ballooned into a new chapter entirely as this most bitter of stories shows no sign of fizzling out as we storm towards the first major at Augusta in April.
Sport needs rivalries, golf more so than most, and different characters and personalities add immense value. Reed has always embraced his role as the bad guy, making this thrilling finale one to savour.
They won’t come too often though, given the litigious nature of this conflict and McIlroy shifting focus away from the DP World Tour to the PGA Tour’s elevated events, having already cashed an exemption to miss the Tournament of Champions. Yet ‘teegate’ has shown us how rivalry and personality can elevate the sport to uncharted territory. The Masters is coming, on this evidence, it is not to be missed.
