McGinley recalls past course of events

For an extraordinary moment on the steps of the clubhouse here at Royal Lytham yesterday afternoon, I experienced that film-star feeling. There in a line across the entrance were about 30 photographers, all Japanese, shutters clicking furiously.

Hardly knowing what to make of all the attention, I suddenly discovered the answer a couple of paces to my right.

Unwittingly, I had chosen to exit the building at precisely the same moment as Shigeki Maruyama, winner of the Great Milwaukee Open last Sunday.

From there, tournament golf's biggest smiler ran the gauntlet of adoring compatriots until he arrived at the media centre for a special press conference - in Japanese. One suspects the attention would have been a lot more muted five years ago, when Maruyama made his British Open debut on this celebrated Lancashire links.

That was when he and Paul McGinley shared 14th place with David Duval and Mark McNulty on 279 - eight strokes behind the champion. For the Japanese golfer, it brought an exemption for the following year at Royal Troon where he was tied 10th.

And for McGinley, there were unforgettable memories of a hole in one and a share of the halfway lead with the eventual winner Tom Lehman.

Interestingly, while Maruyama was holding court, McGinley made a distinctly low-key entrance, sitting in the car-park with a friend, only two hours before the expiry time for player registration. The course looked to be decidedly uninviting while the "wrong" wind - a south-easterly at gale-force five - swept the links

It meant that instead of being played with the aid of a prevailing north-westerly, the opening three holes now presented a fearsome challenge. And at the normally punishing, 412-yard 18th, drives were coming to rest within 40 yards of the green.

"Sure, I remember certain things about 1996, but not very much," said McGinley, before heading out on the course for a gentle piece of reconnaissance rather than a full-scale practice round.

"I remember how my record-equalling round started with a four-iron to 15 feet at the first, where I sank the putt for an opening birdie." He went on: "The next shots that come to mind are a seven-iron approach and an eight-foot putt for a birdie on the eighth. And I couldn't forget the next (164-yard ninth), where my seven-iron tee-shot bounced twice and then ran a few yards before popping into the hole."

In the way of tournament players, he was less anxious to talk about the finish of the round which became a bitter anti-climax. Needing a par on the last to break the course-record 65 set by Christy O'Connor in the second round in 1969, he overshot the green, chipped back to about four and a half feet from the target and was crushed to see the ball rim the hole before staying above ground.

He was renewing acquaintance with a course he played for the first time in 1991 in the Lytham Trophy. And it had also been a rewarding exercise on that occasion insofar as a third-place finish helped considerably in securing a place on the Walker Cup team at Portmarnock in the autumn.

"As I drove into the car park this afternoon and felt the drop in temperature and saw the flags standing straight out from their polls, I might have been going to a Links Society Outing in the middle of winter," he went on.

"But I like Lytham. It presents such a great, strategic challenge that far more players are capable of winning here, unlike St Andrews last year."

It was time for the Dubliner to head towards the only par-three opening hole in championship golf. And as he did so, Japanese photographers were talking animatedly in small groups around the media centre.

Maruyama had obviously given them plenty of smiles.