Pádraig Harrington hopeful of recovery from injury in time for Wentworth

Three-time major winner Pádraig Harrington is optimistic he will recover from injury in time to compete in the BMW PGA Championship, which gets under way at Wentworth on Thursday.

Harrington, who won his first tournament on a major worldwide tour since the 2008 US PGA in the Honda Classic in March, pulled out of the pre-tournament pro-am after suffering a shoulder problem in the gym.

The 43-year-old said: “Working on the principle I’ve never pulled out of an event injured, I believe I’ll make it tomorrow. I’m an optimist. I’ve never pulled out before, and I’ve had some pretty bad injuries at times. If there’s a physical way of me teeing up tomorrow, I will tee it up.

“The chances of me being 100 per cent tomorrow, very slim. The chances of me playing, very high. That would be the way I would look at it.

“I was doing a gym exercise and it was a little bit unstable, there was a little bit of a niggle but I kept on doing it. I hit shots after the gym yesterday, and after I went to bed last night it stiffened during the night and I struggled to sleep with it.

“I got up this morning and it’s what most people would call like a frozen shoulder. There’s a weakness in it and a pain when I go to lift my arm.

“Thankfully I have a late tee time tomorrow, so it will be an extra five hours of movement in the morning and a bit of blood flow into it, and hopefully it will be okay by tomorrow.

“And beware of the injured golfer.”