Mid-July will bring the 142nd
Open Championship, to be played at Muirfield Golf Links in East
Lothian, Scotland, and a massive field of 156 golfers will be hoping
to write their name in the history books and win the 3rd
major of the year.
As has often been the case in recent
history, Tiger Woods goes into the week as one of the hot favourites,
despite not winning a major since 2008. However, he has slowly been
reaching the form that the world knows he is capable of in the past
year, and he will be looking to improve on a 3rd place
finish here last year. Since then, he also came in 5th
place in The Masters, and has racked up 4 tournament wins in 2013 –
more than he managed in the whole of the 3 previous years.
Adam Scott will be looking to banish
some demons in Britain after a monumental collapse last summer in
which he bogeyed the final 4 holes to throw away a comfortable lead.
This year though, he claimed his first major, winning The Masters,
showing that he certainly now has the experience and temperament to
win on the big stage.
Perhaps the player in the best major
form so far this year is Jason Day. He came 3rd in The
Masters, then 2nd in the US Open, so any further
improvement will see him at the top of the final leaderboard this
time around. However, his two previous Open Championship appearances
have seen him finish 60th and 30th, so his
record in Britain is far from impressive.
Another player who is coming closer to
winning his first major is Brandt Snedeker. He finished 3rd
this time last year, and followed that up with a 6th place
finish in The Masters this year. At the other end of the scale, Phil
Mickelson already has 4 majors to his name, and will be hoping to
follow up after a second place finish in the US Open and victory in
Scotland this month.
Of the British players, Lee Westwood
will be looking to win his first major, after showing incredible
consistency in the last few years, finishing in the top 10 in 9 out
of his last 15 major appearances. Rory McIlroy won a major in both
2011 and 2012, but he has failed to hit such form so far in 2013,
failing to put in a strong challenge in either major this year so
far. Graeme McDowell is another player who has struggled so far this
year, and after a consistent performance in major tournaments in
2012, he has failed to even make the cut in The Masters or the US
Open. Justin Rose ended a long wait for his maiden major victory by
winning the US Open this year, and he will be hoping to join the list
of players who have won back-to-back majors in their career.
If there is one nationality that seems
to thrive on playing in Britain, it is the South Africans. They have
10 wins in this championship, and only England, Scotland and the USA
have more. Last year, they produced the winner, Ernie Els, who also
won the tournament the last time that it was held at Muirfield, in
2002. Thomas Aiken also managed to finish 7th last summer,
and their countryman Louis Oosthuizen was victorious in this
championship in 2010.
