
'Right up there' - Portrush shines for Open week
In a week that began with the eventual winner questioning the meaning of it all, there was great purpose in the way the first arriving fans flooded through the gates and on to the course after word spread that McIlroy had snuck out for a practice round at the earliest available opportunity. Those first holes on Monday, and his stints watching chunks of Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer between rounds, must have felt like the briefest slices of quiet for the most recent member of golf's Grand Slam club.At all other points around Royal Portrush, galleries thronged around the Holywood star, the roars that greeted each of his made putts reverberating across the links. While his walk off the 18th green was without the Claret Jug, the love for the returning hero, playing at home for the first time since his Masters victory, was a far more fitting conclusion to his week than the tearful missed cut back in 2019.But it was not just McIlroy who sparked adoration. Americans Bryson DeChambeau and Jordan Spieth, as well as England's Tommy Fleetwood, were among other huge draws obliging as many requests for selfies and autographs as time allowed, while the thump of children's feet along grandstands as players neared with golf balls sounded like the promised thunder. So keen were others to take home a souvenir of their week by more conventional means, queues for the merchandise tent snaked round multiple sets of barriers with one visitor reportedly spending £13,000 in one transaction.Others were content with more transitory pleasures. On Padraig Harrington's insistence that Royal Portrush had the best ice creams on The Open rota, there seemed general agreement after what was surely a record number of 99s consumed up and down the links. A more uniquely Northern Irish staple - the fifteen traybake - proved more divisive in the media centre.The coconut-based treat was not all that failed to gain universal popularity. Jason Day was left confounded by local weather forecasts as the week proved true the old cliche about Northern Ireland featuring all four seasons in one day, while marathon rounds on Thursday left a few players grumbling about bottlenecks on the course. Those that took the time to look around as they waited, though, were rewarded with the spectacular views that make Portrush such a memorable course for the hacker and world's best player alike."It's one of the coolest views that I've seen in the game of golf, to be honest with you," said Scheffler of the course's signature hole Calamity Corner."We were kind of looking out. It was a day in which you had a bunch of rain and there was rainbows on the other side, and you're looking out over the golf course on the right, and you've got the huge bluffs by the ocean and it's just mounds and hills, and the town is in the distance."
Even Shane Lowry, who had the best day of his golfing life here six years ago when winning the 148th Open Championship, cut a wholly frustrated figure at points during a weekend when he was handed a two-shot penalty on Friday and struggled with illness in his third round.Still, after a brilliant closing 66 on Sunday, Royal Portrush had clearly redeemed itself in the Offaly man's eyes when all was said and done.Asked by BBC Sport NI when would he like to see The Open be back here for its fourth staging, he replied: "How about next year?"While it will surely be longer than a six-year wait for another go this time around, after another hugely successful week, a return sooner rather than later seems a certainty.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Times
2 hours ago
- Times
Adrian Dunbar: ‘I'm really excited about the new Line of Duty'
Adrian Dunbar, 66, grew up in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland. He is best known for playing Superintendent Ted Hastings in the BBC police drama Line of Duty and was nominated for a Bafta for the role in 2018. The last episode of the final season in 2021 was watched by 12.8 million viewers. He featured in the film Emily and the musical Kiss Me, Kate and now stars in police drama Ridley. He lives with his wife in London. Working in an abattoir was a very good grounding in how difficult it is to earn £20. I still love a bacon sandwich. It gives you a perspective on life that you don't forget. I've taken a lot of pleasure in watching Kneecap rinsing the system. [Kneecap are a controversial Irish rap group who made comments about the Israel-Palestine conflict at Glastonbury and Coachella.] They're an amazing act and they've caught the zeitgeist. But they're good people and conscientious people. I'm going to go and see them with my daughter, just to see what the craic is.


The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Defeated but proud: Madrileños brave the heat to roar on La Roja
Despite the air-fryer temperature outside and the imminent, annual August exodus, the people of Madrid weren't going to miss out on another opportunity to watch their national football team prove its mettle against the country that had given the world the beautiful game. After all, recent international fixtures had not gone all that badly for them. By 5.45pm on Sunday, the Parque de Berlín, which lies 1 mile east of the Bernabéu stadium, was filling up with people who were braving the 35C (95F) heat to stand in front of a large and heavily sponsored screen. Some drank beer, others picnicked or fanned themselves, and some queued for free T-shirts. An admirably patriotic Spanish mastiff had also turned out, a rojigualda flag proudly knotted around its thick and magnificent neck. Close by stood municipal health workers and police officers who had probably endured more strenuous assignments. All, however, were inclined to agree with the excitable MC who bellowed that they were about to witness something very, very special as the countdown to the women's Euro final began. 'We have to look at this as something amazing,' he hollered over the PA system, which was loud even by Spanish standards. 'This is a triumph for the women's team. They're going to make history! They're going to do it again!' The Spanish capital and its public spaces are not without practice when it comes to massive spectator events, especially when the sport in question is football and the opponents are England. A little over a year ago, thousands of spectators had packed the Plaza de Colón in central Madrid to watch La Roja beat England 2-1 to clinch a fourth men's Euro title. And, almost a year before that, the red-and-yellow hordes had descended on the WiZink Center venue to experience the giddy high of Spain winning the Women's World Cup 1-0. That day, once again, England were the runners-up. As the match began, those who had come to the park to watch the final reflected on what the game meant – and offered final-score predictions. Joaquina, a 60-year-old civil servant from Madrid, sat on a bench with her friend María and shared her immoveable certainty. 'We're going to win – there's no doubt about that,' she said. 'We're the best.' Her prediction was equally unwavering: 'We're going to win it 2-0.' María was just as convinced. 'Today is a very important day,' she said. 'And we're going to win it.' Although the crowd was mixed-age – from babies and toddlers to grandparents – it was noticeably more female than usual. As far as Elena, a 49-year-old teacher, was concerned, that was hardly surprising. 'Today is a really important day because they've worked really hard to get here,' she said, waiting alongside her daughters for the game to begin. 'Spain always comes to a standstill when the men's team play and do well – which is great. But we need to see the same thing when the women play.' The team, she said, had overcome adversity on so many fronts – not just on the pitch but also against their own federation. 'They've fought so much and they're role models for young Spanish women and girls.' Sign up to Moving the Goalposts No topic is too small or too big for us to cover as we deliver a twice-weekly roundup of the wonderful world of women's football after newsletter promotion Her daughter Inés nodded her agreement: 'It's really special and I'm so happy for them.' Apart from being happy, how confident was she? 'Oh, they'll win 3-0.' Proof of the growing appeal of the women's game was evident in the number of young men who had also decided to watch the match alfresco. The cheer that greeted Mariona Caldentey's goal in the 25th minute of the match was full-throated and equally male and female. 'Women's football is really growing here and it's great to see so many people here have brought their kids,' said a Mexican man who is married to a Spaniard. 'We've just had a baby girl so it's important to be here and to know that she can have a future in football if she decides that's what she wants to do.' Also in the crowd was a five-year-old girl named Leire, who was sitting on the sand next to her mother, Aymara. 'We came down here because she's really excited by women's football,' said Aymara. 'In fact, she's so into the women's game that she complains if we watch the men's game at home.' Leire's generation, she added, had seen Spain's women win the World Cup and simply couldn't understand why their game wasn't as celebrated as the men's. The young Barcelona supporter also felt confident of a Spanish triumph. 'We're going to win 3,000-0,' Leire predicted. But it was not to be. After full-time, extra time and a heart-stopping penalty shootout, England triumphed over a superior Spain. As the sun began to go down over the park, the crowds drifted away, hot, tired and disappointed, but not dejected. Spain's women had done their country proud. Again.


Reuters
3 hours ago
- Reuters
Stokes ready to deal with increased workload despite feeling sore all over
MANCHESTER, England, July 27 (Reuters) - With England seemingly reliant on Ben Stokes with bat and ball, the struggling skipper insisted "pain is just an emotion" as he plans to take to the field for his side's fifth and deciding test against India this week. The England captain struggled with cramp in his left leg and was feeling his shoulder as the hosts failed to bowl India out in their second innings at Old Trafford on Sunday and had to settle for a fourth test draw. Stokes took his first five-wicket haul for eight years in India's first innings, an impressive feat given his recent injury issues. "It's just a workload sort of thing," Stokes told reporters after the draw with India left England leading 2-1 in the five-match series. "We got a fair amount of overs and everything starts creeping up on you. I'll keep trying, keep going and as I say to all the bowlers: pain is just an emotion. "I'll always try to run through a brick wall for the team." Stokes revealed he had hurt his bicep tendon, with his injury niggles the result of a taxing workload that has seen him already send down 140 overs in four tests -- the most he has ever bowled in a series. However, Stokes, the leading wicket-taker of the series, is optimistic of taking to the field at the Oval on Thursday as England try to seal a 3-1 series triumph. "Hopefully I will be alright going for the last one," he said. "I am doing everything possible to be alright. It's been a big five or six weeks, I'll always try to give everything I possibly can. "I don't want to eat my words, but the likelihood I won't play is very unlikely." India showed great character to battle to an unexpected draw, given they are a young team. Shubman Gill, 25, is playing his first test series as captain following the retirements of Indian greats Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ravichandran Ashwin. Coach Gautam Gambhir reserved special praise for his skipper, who became only the third captain to score four hundreds in a single test series to help his side salvage a draw. "These are characters who are sat in the dressing room wanting to fight for their country," Gambhir told reporters. "I don't believe in something like transition. It is still an Indian team. It is only experience and inexperience. Being under pressure, batting five sessions against an attack like England, will do so much for them. "An important thing is he (Gill) is living up to his expectations and his talent. When he goes into bat, he goes in as a batsman, not a captain."