Justin Rose of England reacts to his chip shot to the 2nd green during the second round of the 2008 Masters golf tournament. Photo / Reuters
As the greenbacks pile up, the endorsements stretch around the dogleg and the attendants indulge each and every fancy, it is perhaps not the time to start bleating about sporting injustice.
Yet Justin Rose would not have been human, and certainly would not have been a golfer, if
he had resisted raging against the fates as he set out in the 72nd Masters here last night.
With two rounds to go of the year's first major, Rose was down the field and in his own mind "out". And all because of one moment of badness.
"It's not the exciting weekend I was looking forward to," said the young Englishman before teeing off at two-over, 10 behind the leader, South African Trevor Immelman.
"The 15th was a 20-second lapse in concentration." Yes, 20 lapsed seconds in a round lasting five-and-a-quarter hours and the whole tournament is lost in a blast of Georgian dirt. Such is golf and such is its unique savagery.
So what went wrong for the early leader? Was it simply, as most of the viewers would have believed, an instant of aberration when he dunked a lob wedge into the creek when just 80 yards from the flag?
As ever in golf the reality is rather more complex. It was the second shot that had angered Rose most of all.
"In hindsight I probably should have gone for the green," he said, clearly feeling he had betrayed a fine drive that left the putting surface reachable. "It was right on the limit. One of these things. I laid up way too close to the green and the way they grow the grain into you, I had a bit of a tricky lie and no yardage."
Plop! It was the sound the hacker fears most. Lost ball, lost hope.
- THE INDEPENDENT
