matt Fitzpatrick’s caddie, Billy Foster, known as it a monstrosity. Two-time Open champion Pádraig Harrington claimed it was once “without doubt one of the most beautiful par-threes you will ever see”. Perhaps Jon Rahm was once essentially the most correct this week in describing Little Eye, the brand new seventeenth hollow at Royal Liverpool, no longer because the worst or best possible factor in golfing, however merely “a turtleshell”.
An increased inexperienced with dangerously deep bunkers on each side and no obtrusive bail out, the one option to keep away from bother is to land the ball squarely at the inexperienced. It is so much more straightforward mentioned than completed. It’s a terrifying shot, like looking to flick a marble onto a automotive bonnet.
In an age the place distance is king, it is a other take a look at for the sector’s best possible. In many ways, the seventeenth is what the Open is all about, unpredictable, checking out and uncovered to the weather.
You could make birdie right here, however you should additionally simply make a six.
As the smallest inexperienced at the route (round a 3rd smaller than the typical inexperienced dimension at Hoylake), there are obtrusive comparisons with different nice par threes: Royal Troon’s Postage Stamp or the seventeenth island inexperienced at TPC Sawgrass. It isn’t designed to be great.
For a championship this is at pains to speak about its historical past and remind us how its dunes and fairways are honed through the weather – the grandstands right here at Royal Liverpool all raise the grand reminder of Hoylake being ‘Forged By Nature’ – this can be a novelty to seek out one thing new, glossy and man-made. The architect of the opening, Martin Ebert, mentioned the R&A had talked to him about short of to “create some drama right at the end of the Open”.
“Even with a four-shot lead, someone who is in that great position will be nervous when they’re standing on this tee”, persevered Ebert.
The hollow has been totally flipped, in order that avid gamers now hit against the coast and into the present wind, a transfer that has additionally allowed Royal Liverpool to elongate the adjoining par-five 18th to over 600 yards. Heavy tough and a large bunker guard the seventeenth inexperienced back and front, so membership selection is vital, particularly with the gusts.
Players used the entirety from a five-iron to an opening wedge in follow.
Patrick Reed, the 2018 Masters champion and some of the LIV golfers aiming for a Ryder Cup berth in September, was once fortunate to flee with a bogey on Thursday, after most effective relatively misjudging his tee shot.
“The 129-yard pin was playing about 140-142,” he mentioned. “You just never know with the wind. In practice I hit a flighted seven-iron, and a gap wedge to the back half of the green. Today, I hit the pitching wedge. [into the front bunker] but I was a yard short of being on top.”
Despite his struggles, Reed remains a fan of this corner of Hoylake. “When you make par-threes 300 or 310, those are the dumbest holes on the planet,” he said. “What’s the point? You don’t need length to make a par-three hard. All you need is a diabolical green, some hazards and some wind and that will be enough to challenge the top players in the world.”
The worst place to finish off the tee is right, tantalizingly close to Thursday’s tricky pin position, with a steep guttering slope that collects any stray shots into a deep bunker, like a sadistic pinball machine with no flippers.
To get out of the trap, players must not only clear the steep front lip of the bunker but also ascend another 10ft of fairway before the safety of the green. Hit it too hard and the ball could easily fly off the dancefloor and end up in more sand on the other side. Too soft and the ball will simply roll back down the grassy bank back into your footprints.
Shots from the tee and the bunkers are made completely blind and just like taking off a bandage on a nasty wound, there is a painful wait to what damage has been done. Only once you are standing on the green, with a fine view of the Wirral coast and the Little Eye island on the Dee estuary from which the hole gets its name, do you know what’s what.
One of Thursday’s biggest casualties was Lucas Herbert, who arrived on the tee box as the early leader at three-under but left the 17th at even-par after an ugly six. Having missed the green long and left from the tee, he chipped through the green to the right sand, duffed his first bunker shot into the bank, chipped out to 18ft and two-putted.
“I don’t think I’ll be the only one to run up a big number,” he mentioned after signing for an even-par 71. “Our staff all ignored the fairway. It’s no longer simple. When there is no wind, it is a hole wedge and you’ll make a two lovely simply, however that wind will get going and you’ll’t actually really feel it an excessive amount of at the enclosed tee. It turns into a actually difficult shot.”
“I had kind of one foot within the bunker, one foot out,” Herbert continued. “It didn’t come out the way I wanted and it rolled back in. It felt like there were about 5,000 professional golfers sitting around us in the stands watching it.”
Hoylake contributors staring at on from the stands don’t seem to be execs, in fact, however a few of them are fuming in regards to the adjustments to this a part of the route. If one of the crucial global’s best possible are making triple bogey in July, what probability do the 15-20 handicappers have with the wind howling within the wintry weather?
Still, that may be a downside for the amateurs. For this week most effective, what the seventeenth does here’s a grandstand end for the avid gamers and the punters. It’s a possible card wrecker, and are available Sunday, Little Eye will scare the existence out of the chief and provides past due hope to the chasing pack.