Despite all the exciting action happening inside the ropes, the real star of this 150th Open Championship has been the course. Or sho uld we say The Course. The Old Course at St. Andrews, the oldest and most iconic golf course in the world.
Everyone — from players to media to fans — have fawned over the ancient links all week. Everyone, it seems, but Matt Fitzpatrick.
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The 2022 U.S. Open champion is having a great week at the Open so far, riding scores of 66 and 69 in rounds 2 and 3 to a nine-under total. He starts the final round T8. But you wouldn’t know it from the comments he made following Saturday’s round at “the Home of Golf.”
Instead of showering the host venue with praise as his competitors have done, Fitzpatrick opened up about how little he likes what Tiger Woods calls his favorite 18 holes in the world.
“I’ll be honest, I’m not really a fan,” Fitzpatrick said on Saturday. “I’ve heard it on commentary all week. You can hit good shots and get bad bounces. And you can hit bad shots and get good bounces. I felt, for the first seven holes, I didn’t really miss a shot. I’m walking off 7th green and I’m plus-1. It’s tough to take. It’s tough to stay patient.”
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Despite his solid score in the third round, and the near-record low scores this week, Fitzpatrick was feeling snakebitten by the course, which he argued has been tricked up for the final major of the year.
“I said earlier in the week that it’s not my favorite golf course to play,” Fitpatrick added. “But I think, obviously, with how firm it is, they obviously exaggerate some of the slopes and stuff as well. You see where the pins are this week. A lot of them are incredibly tucked, just to try and protect it as much as possible.”
Starting the day seven shots back, Fitzpatrick’s chances of winning back-to-back majors are slim. But should he pull off a legendary comeback to win this Open, it will be interesting to see if there’s any change in his opinion of the course he did it on.