A classic Masters? Not quite. An unforgettable Masters? Definitely.
Here’s a few observations. A couple of them serious, most of them not:Tiger Woods is quite possibly the most unlikeable sportsman in my lifetime. And that’s including Will Carling. He would have won if hadn’t been for the width of a flag stick though. It will take more than a move to Florida to make Lee Westwood a good putter, it would appear. Makes you think good putters are born, not made. I’d be amazed if Westwood ever wins a Green Jacket. Same goes for Sergio Garcia. I’d be surprised if Thorbjorn Olesen doesn’t. It took admirable resilience, skill and mental strength for Adam Scott to recover so quickly from his Open nightmare and win his first major. Would it have been beyond him if his wrists/nerves had been a factor on short putts though? The fact that it’s open to debate means the sooner anchored putters are banned, the better. It’s an unfair advantage when the pressure is on. Tournament referees need to be assessed in the same way as football ones are. If they don’t enforce slow play penalties, they should be stood down. It was getting quite enjoyable to see Australian sporting misery piled on Australian sporting misery. Having three Aussies near the top of the leaderboard after the third round, with none of them winning, would have topped the lot. Over to Messrs Gatland, Cook and their boys to put them in their place again in the summer. Do Adidas only have one golf shirt this year? Seeing the same pattern for four days in different colours on about half a dozen golfers was television torture. Bernhard Langer should leave the orange to Ricky Fowler. Thirty years too late for a makeover. Still on the subject of colour, if I never see another green and white umbrella it will be a day too soon. Makes you long for the multi-coloured grandstands of Muirfield on a wet July afternoon. British TV summarisers just because the Augusta blazers call their paying customers “patrons”, doesn’t mean the rest of us have to. Crowd, spectators, galleries will do just fine. Same people if you call them pine needles for 361 days of the year, why, with the honourable exception of Peter Alliss, do you call them pine straw for four? Michael Vaughan’s incisive greenside interviewing technique for the BBC wasn’t missed. There’s a surprise. Listening to Wayne Grady when Adam Scott, or “Scotty” to him, is on screen is as infuriating as when Jonathan Davies commentates on a Wales Six Nations match. Unless it’s Tiger or Monty, no nicknames should be allowed. Long lost brothers? Jason Day and Manny Pacquiao. Ken Brown discussing slow play and Monty rules infringements. Irony, I think they call it. I’ve never racked up double figures on a par three. Therefore I must be better than Bubba Watson.