It's been a madcap day at St Andrews, and it's hard to believe we are only halfway to discovering who will win the Claret Jug. For the first time since 1988, the Open Championship will finish on a Monday. It's because of the heavy rain which drenched the course on Friday morning and caused a delay of over 3 hours and it's because of high winds gusting at 40 miles per hour which precipitated a stoppage of over 10 hours on Saturday.
There was the farcical sight of Louis Oosthuizen's ball moving by magic on the green first thing this morning, the subject of many a 'Vine' by now. Conditions were unplayable, and the organisers, the Royal and Ancient, are now under the spotlight for letting players onto the course for 32 minutes.
Dustin Johnson dropped a shot, Jason Day made two bogeys and Jordan Spieth appears irritated with the situation. You now have a scenario where Johnson leads the tournament on 10 under and Day is 7 under. In a tightly packed leader board, will the shots they dropped on Saturday cost them by Monday? If they do it will be an embarrassment to the R&A, akin to the criticism the USGA deservedly received in June for the state of the putting surfaces during the US Open at Chambers Bay.
This is my first visit to St Andrews and it may be too short for professional golf in its current guise. It measures only 7,297 yards, it contains so many par 4 holes under 400 yards and with little rough, wind and bunkers are its sole defence. If conditions are benign, the bunkers can be negotiated by the bombers such as Johnson. If the greens are 10 on the stimpmeter, there is always the risk that balls will oscillate. If the greens were slower, we could have played today and it would have been a fascinating test. Golf was played in the surrounding area. On the other hand, if the 'dancefloor' was slow in calm conditions, players would threaten 60. That's the dilemma of this course.
The man pictured, John Daly, won The Open in a play off in 1995 after posting a 72 hole score of only 6 under par during a windy week. Since then, the winning scores at St Andrews at The Open have been 19 under, 14 under and 16 under. The undulating terrain of the 'Valley of Sin' on 18 is meant to be a challenge to test Championship golfers in a major. Dustin Johnson drove past it and onto the green today. There are ways of setting up a course fairly and making it a test, as was the case with The Open at Muirfield only 2 years ago. Muirfield hasn't changed for years, but Phil Mickelson's winning total of 3 under par was the only score under par. You would love to see a situation on Monday resembling 1984, when at the death, Tom Watson found the road on the 17th, 'the Road Hole', as Seve Ballesteros was skilfully negotiating 18, making birdie and earning it. There's a lot of thought required for the great people of St Andrews ahead of the 2020 Open, when this wonderful major returns to the 'Home of Golf'.
Nevertheless, we have 2 intriguing rounds of action to look forward to on Sunday and Monday. Let's hope Paul Dunne, the 22 year old amateur from Wicklow, can keep it going. He's 6 under par right now, in a tie for tenth and heads Padraig Harrington and Graeme McDowell, the other 2 Irishmen to make the cut. Paul Dunne did what Tiger Woods, Darren Clarke and Shane Lowry could not. He booked his ticket to Sunday and Monday in style. What a wonderful story.
