It may not be obvious underneath the mild-mannered, usually smiling demeanour, but the man accused of settling for second too often is boiling about so many near things and prepared to put it right at the head of the best ever field for the £4 million BMW PGA Championship this week.
It would be understandable to many that Luke Donald might be happy to be world number two, to have contended at multiple events and to be the most consistent player in world over the last six months, even happy with his second place to Simon Khan at this event a year ago.
Some have even accused him of this and “Luke Donald syndrome” became shorthand for a self-satisfied golfer happy to cash cheques and not caring enough to win. Instead Donald admits “big irritation” with his seconds, including last year’s here and last week’s in the Volvo Matchplay in Spain.
“I had that tournament last week, I felt I should have won it, and I didn’t,” he said. “It’s all very well saying there’s always next week but it leaves a bitter taste in the mouth to be second.
“I think about what went wrong and how I’ll do it differently. I was down on Sunday night but I don’t drag it from week to week. “There’s never been a champion that hasn’t lost, and you should learn more from losing than winning.”
There’s certainly no more consistent player in the world right now than Donald, and should world number three Martin Kaymer finish out of the top two this week, Donald will leapfrog Lee Westwood as world number one if he has a higher finish than his countryman.
“I’m surprised they didn’t pair us together this week,” he said. “Consistency pays, and the rankings do a pretty good job of showing who is consistently the best player, but whether you go with guys who’ve won majors, that’s a different call.
“I think if you ask Martin, Lee or myself, the race for number one is nice but it isn’t the focus. Trying to win every week is the focus.”
George O’Grady, the European Tour’s executive director, has every right to be rather satisfied with his lot this week.
The biggest event that the tour runs features a full-on race for the position of best player in the world, all four current major champions, seven of the top 10 in the world, and while the PGA has outranked the competing event on the US Tour for some years now, the gap over the Byron Nelson event in Texas is colossal this week. Furthermore, the Ryder Cup is in European hands and all but the injured Padraig Harrington from the team that won at Celtic Manor are present here.Glittering affairThis week’s annual tour dinner was a glittering affair, and that was even before the various trophies were aligned for display. Westwood reckons that the pull from the US to Surrey should be even greater this week.
“The only thing lacking this week are a few more Americans, and it would be nice to see a few of the younger ones come over,” he said. “To be the best you’ve got to test yourself across the world.
“One thing I recognised from the dinner last night, it’s really a world game, the major champions are two South Africans, a Northern Irishman and a German.”
Wentworth has had a tradition of seeing a “journeyman” a description the tour hates come through to win, but notwithstanding Khan’s surprise win last year, the tightened West Course should result in the considerable amount of cream here rising to the top.
Last year’s scathing reviews for the re-drawn course resulted in owner Richard Caring holding his hands up and then digging them deep in his pockets for £500,000 worth of further changes, most notably a remodelled 18th green which is now worth the risk of trying to reach in two blows, a re-levelling of the frankly daft eighth green, and an opening up of the drive on the 15th.
Opinion, so far, has been unanimously positive, and hopefully the finish is restored to something like the level of the great years on the West where no lead was safe if the pursuers still had two holes to play.
The quality of field and occasion this week deserve nothing more.