Let’s be brutally honest, The Masters hasn’t been an especially happy hunting ground for Irish competitors. Since 2007, Irish players have racked up 10 major titles but the Green Jacket continues to elude anyone from these shores.
Joe Carr, an amateur legend, led the way for Ireland in 1967 when he made his debut at The Masters. Since then a further 15 Irish golfers (both professional and amateur) have taken the April pilgrimage to Georgia for the opening major of the season and all have returned empty-handed.
The perceived wisdom for many years was that the tournament was held too early in the season for golfers from these shores, many of whom hibernated during the winter.
There may once have been a grain of truth in that statement, but that excuse hasn’t held water for some 30 years with our leading lights playing golf 12 months a year all over the world.
We have had the odd glimmer of hope. Darren Clarke led by three after round one in 2003 but ultimately finished in a tie for 28th while in 2011 Rory McIlroy led by four heading in the final round only to post a disastrous closing round 80 to finish in 15th.
The fact is, winning at Augusta is hard and there isn’t any one reason why an Irishman has yet to break through and win. Simply put, a mixture of bad luck and bad play has conspired to keep us waiting and we’re not the only ones.
Statistically speaking the tournament has been dominated by US competitors since its inception. Even over the last decade, as US golfers have lost their grip at the top of the world rankings, they’ve still managed to win six times.
For added context, the first European success was via the supremely gifted Seve Ballesteros in 1980 and since then only seven other Europeans have pulled on the green jacket.
So maybe a bit of patience is required, come to think of it, a bit of prayer wouldn’t go amiss if you are so inclined.
This year Seamus Power will be returning to Augusta for his just second time, Rory McIlroy will be making his 15th start while Shane Lowry is gearing up to compete in his eighth Masters. The fourth Irishman in the field - and now the 17th Irish competitor in total - is Malone’s Matt McClean, who earned his place courtesy of a brilliant victory in the US Mid-Am last September.
Last April, Lowry’s tie for third (behind Rory McIlroy) was his best performance at Augusta National.
It propelled him to a stellar 2022 that included victory at the DP World Tour flagship event, the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth.
Unfortunately, the opening months of 2023 haven’t gone as well and the decision to replace caddy Bo Martin towards the end of January has yet to provide any real spark.
The 2019 Open Championship winner has just one top 10 to his name on the PGA Tour this year, a tied fifth at the Honda Classic.
Yet Lowry has shown an ability to rise to the challenge in big events.
In addition to his Open win at Royal Portrush, he finished runner-up in the 2016 US Open at Oakmont and tied for fourth in the 2021 PGA Championship at Kiawah Island.
On paper, Rory McIlroy and The Masters is a match made in heaven but so far that Green Jacket has remained out of reach for the Holywood golfer. With a victory, he would join Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, and Tiger Woods as winners of the career Grand Slam.
At times he has appeared to struggle under the weight of expectation and while his form this season has not matched that of late 2022 he has still won the Dubai Desert Classic in January, finished runner-up in the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando, and reached the semifinals of the WGC-Match Play in Austin.
McIlroy will start the event as one of the pre-event favourites and rightly so. He has top-10 finishes in seven of the past nine years.
Last year he closed out his final round with a birdie from the greenside bunker to shoot 64 and finish runner-up, his best round and best result at the Masters.
The least heralded of the professional trio at Augusta this week is Waterford’s Seamus Power who will definitely be going under the radar.
Something of a late bloomer, the 35-year-old earned his invitation back in October when he won his second career PGA Tour title in Bermuda. Power harbours genuine ambitions to play on Europe’s Ryder Cup team in September and a solid showing this week would enhance his credentials. Last year he made his debut in all four major championships and acquitted himself well finishing T-9 in the PGA Championship at Southern Hills, T-12 in the U.S. Open at The Country Club and T-27 in the Masters. His only blip came at The Open where he missed the cut.
The final golfer from these shores lining up at Augusta is Belfast amateur Matthew McClean. The 29-year-old Malone GC member, an Irish international, claimed a place in the field by beating fellow Irish international Hugh Foley in the final of the 2022 US Mid-Amateur at Erin Hills. An optometrist, McClean isn’t really contemplating winning this week. One of seven amateurs in the field, his first target is to make the cut and somehow claim the title as low-amateur of the week.
He has spent the last three weeks in America on a bit of a golfing odyssey as he gears up for his date with destiny.
