Oosthuizen was ready for major step

UNFORTUNATELY, LOUIS Oosthuizen won’t be able to join the major line-up at next week’s 3 Irish Open. Rather, the new British Open champion – who has stood by a commitment to play in this week’s Scandinavian Masters – will take the opportunity to fly home to South Africa for five days of celebrating before then resuming tournament play at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational in Akron, one of his perks for winning at St Andrews.

Oosthuizen doesn’t have any complicated philosophy on his immediate future.

“I’m going to take it one thing at a time, to see where it takes me,” he remarked.

In moving to a career high 15th on the world rankings following his major victory, the South African – who yesterday mentioned his Irish Amateur Open win at Royal Dublin in 2002 as confirming to him he had the game to go out on tour – explained his tour win in the Andalucian Open earlier this season finally gave him the confidence to believe he could take the next step up to winning a major.

“I’d won (tournaments) in South Africa but you wanted to win in Europe just to get that big step, to get the monkey off your shoulder. You play in South Africa and you’re comfortable on the courses. It’s not as tough as it is in Europe. Top fives and seconds weren’t good enough, I needed a win. That just got me in a different mindset,” said Oosthuizen.

Now, with one major in the bag, he is determined to add more. “I think winning one just wants you to get to the second one and winning a second one and then get to the third. Yeah, I’m going to work a bit harder probably from now on and just try and get up there to as many majors as I can,” he added.

Incidentally, Tiger Woods – who is currently without a coach – may take note of the fact Peter Cowen has brought home the last two major winners, Graeme McDowell and now Oosthuizen.

Always recognised as one of the best drivers in the game, Oosthuizen brought in the Englishman to work mainly on his short game. And, yesterday, when asked what areas he needed to work on, he responded without a second’s hesitation: “I always say, short game, short game, short game.”

At yesterday morning’s RA post-championship press conference, Peter Dawson – the secretary of the RA – paid tribute to Oosthuizen’s winning performance. “I think based on the margin of victory, his demeanour on the golf course, the quality of his game and the steady progress he’s been making in the world rankings and in tour events very much mark him as a player on the rise.

“Every great Open champion has to win for the first time sometime or other. That’s self-evident. And I for one would not be surprised to see him win again.”

Dawson also claimed that moving back the 17th tee – the hole was ranked as the toughest throughout the championship – was “a great success”. He added: “We were hoping that the road might come more back into play, and by gosh, it did. We had far more people on the road this year through the back of the hole than I’ve seen at previous Opens in recent times. To that degree we are very pleased with the hole, and the player comments by and large have been very positive.”