Every now and then, there are sporting moments so perfect they seem guided by fate. A rare instance where the collective yearning is so fiercely ingrained it forces itself into fruition. When Rory McIlroy stepped into one of the cavernous bunkers that guards the tenth hole at St Andrews, he had trailed his playing partner Viktor Hovland by one shot at the top of the leaderboard. But as the Northern Irishman’s ball carried the steep ledge that fronts the green and skidded to a halt just in time to catch the lip of the hole, the sense of destiny felt almost irresistable. That would downplay the reality, of course, which required something close to golfing genius.
After eight years of withering near-misses and endless introspection, McIlroy will take a share of the lead into the final round of The Open. There will still be 18 holes of relentless pressure, the vagaries of the weather and not least the threat of Hovland to negotiate on a Sunday that could exorcise so many demons, but McIlroy could hardly have wished for better than a round of 66 that featured just a single bogey at the Road Hole. In the same vein of calm conviction he has shown all week, the 33-year-old immediately made amends with a birdie at the last and the shouts of approval that greeted him will now turn bleary with excitement and expectation.
