Woods casts long shadow

GOLF:This time, it's different; the beast has been muzzled, and everyone is happy. Sure, the weather could be better, but there's no whingeing or moaning about unplayable rough and, in contrast to the last time that the British Open was staged on the Carnoustie links in 1999, players are entering this latest edition of golf's oldest major championship without fear in their hearts.

Ironically, this course, lengthened to 7,421 yards, is the longest ever played in the British Open. But, in these days of drivers made from the same metals as spacecraft and golf balls that travel with the velocity of bullets, length is not what puts fear into a professional golfer. To do that, as we found out eight years ago, you need to grow rough so thick it resembles a jungle.

So, with lessons learnt from 1999 when the links was dubbed "Car-nasty" by American players who wished they'd never set foot in the place, the R&A have this time widened the fairways - generally ranging to between 28-30 yards wide - and framed them with a three-yard collar of rough mowed to approximately one and a half inches. Beyond that, the primary rough is four to six inches deep.

It is a fairer set-up, and it is designed so that balls landing on the fairway but running off into the rough won't at least end up in the really deep stuff. The intermediate cut will act as a buffer zone.

"The rough is very escapable," admitted Graeme McDowell, while Colin Montgomerie gushed, "The set-up is nigh on perfect in every way . . . it will be seen as what it is, one of the toughest and best links courses that we have in the world."

Unfortunately, though, the recent rain - which continued to drench the links yesterday - has also taken some of the fire out of the course. It won't play hard and firm, with Sergio Garcia making the point that players will find it easier to hit the fairways and easier to keep the ball on the greens.

"If we don't get some wind coming, the scores are going to be very low," said Garcia.

It is indeed a very different golf course to the one at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake where Tiger Woods used a driver just once in 72 holes to successfully retain the claret jug he had won the previous year at St Andrews. Woods will be seeking a so-called "three-peat" of British Open titles, a feat that was last accomplished by the Australian Peter Thomson in 1956.

Woods, justifiably, is the favourite. Nobody peaks as well for majors as the world's number one, who in his last four majors has finished 1st-1st-2nd-2nd. Those two most recent runner-up finishes came to Zach Johnson in the US Masters and, last month, to Angel Cabrera in the US Open. So, at least we do know that he is fallible.

"He's the man," agreed McDowell. "It's not impossible to win when he's around but it is tougher, he doesn't know how to lose. I think we'll all look back in 30 or 40 years' time and think we were privileged to be playing at the same time as the greatest player the world has ever seen."

Whoever does collect the title come Sunday evening will have had to play well for all four days and, most likely will have to fend off Woods down what is arguably the toughest finishing stretch - from the 15th - in golf.

Pádraig Harrington, at least, can draw on the experience of staring Tiger in the eye and winning. He did it at the Target World Challenge in 2002 and again in the Phoenix tournament in Japan last November. Is that a plus? "It's more of a plus because I did what I wanted to do. I'm a much better player when I'm an underdog, when my back is to the wall and I have to produce something . . . so, yes, it is a positive for me."

Harrington - one of seven Irish players in the field, along with McDowell, Darren Clarke, Paul McGinley, David Higgins, Justin Kehoe and Rory McIlroy - is due another good performance in the British Open. He has missed the cut in six of his last nine major appearances, and since his fifth-place finish in 2002, when he was one stroke outside a play-off place, he has gone 22nd-missed cut-did not play-missed cut.

Is it time to deliver? "I just have to keep working on a numbers game, to keep playing and to keep getting myself into contention. Just because I've won here before (in the Dunhill Links), I can't say it is my big chance. By having an attitude like that will only put more pressure on you . . . the key is to tone it down all the way and just play to get yourself into position with nine holes to go on Sunday," said Harrington.

There is also the added expectation that Carnoustie, as the venue that produced the last European winner of a major in Paul Lawrie, can deliver again.

To that end, Harrington is entitled to be viewed as one of those most likely to end that drought for Europe, but another likely candidate is Sweden's Niclas Fasth who is one of the hottest players on tour with a run of 8th-4th-1st-2nd in his last four appearances.

Harrington doesn't expect a springer, a la Todd Hamilton or Ben Curtis, to triumph. Time will tell, but yet again Woods, seeking his third straight Open title, is the man everyone has to beat.