Wyndham Clark, a 29-year-old American who had only notched up his first PGA Tour victory last month, won the 123rd US Open at the Los Angeles Country Club on Sunday, prevailing by a shot from Ireland’s four-time major champion, Rory McIlroy. “I’ve worked so hard and dreamed about this moment for so long,” said the new champion. “There’s been so many times I’ve visualised being here in front of you guys and winning this championship. I just felt it was my time.”
A pivotal moment may have come at the par-five 8th, where he pulled his second shot into thick rough and his first attempt to extricate his ball left it pretty much where it was. But a perfect chip shot earned him a bogey and he repeatedly performed short-game magic coming home, notably to save par at the 11th and then again at the 17th, where he was facing the prospect of a third successive bogey, which would have dropped him back into a tie with McIlroy.
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For the latter, the disappointment was palpable. He has finished in the top-10 in 19 major championships since he last won one, the 2014 USPGA. No one has had as many of those as him. On the other hand, in that period Brooks Koepka has won five majors. “When I do finally win this next major,” McIlroy said, “it’s going to be really, really sweet. Sooner or later it’s going to happen for me.” His positive thinking is to be admired but I am quite positive that in order for it to happen he is going to need to have a better Sunday on the greens. At the LA Country Club on Sunday, as at St Andrews in the Open last year, he closed with a round of 70 in which he took 36 putts. You can’t win anything if over half your shots are putts.
Related: Tommy Fleetwood agonisingly close to slice of major history
A footnote or three. On Sunday, Tommy Fleetwood became the first man to shoot 63 twice in a US Open. As in 2018, it wasn’t enough to win. This one came on the 50th anniversary of Johnny Miller shooting a closing 63 to win the US Open at Oakmont, the first time 63 had been shot in any major. On Saturday, Scottie Scheffler concluded his round with an eagle two followed by a birdie three – which meant he had played over 1000 yards of golf in just five shots. And on Thursday, Ricky Fowler and Xander Schauffele both returned eight-under-par 62, the lowest single score ever for a round in the US Open.
The club will likely get the US Open again one day. Or not? Many players didn’t think much of the course. For example, Viktor Hovland said: “I think there are some good holes. I don’t think there are any great holes. I think there are a few bad holes.” Maybe more pertinently, the members of this ultra-swish club (joining fee; $250,000) didn’t seem too keen on hosting it; only 9,000 tickets per day were put on general sale, apparently at the club’s insistence. But, then again, perhaps that should be no shock. A journalist I know said the attitude of the membership during the 2017 Walker Cup there had been the “most unfriendly” of any golf tournament he had ever attended, and he’s been to hundreds.
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