2 1GSK1 Saturday April 9 2022 | the times
WEEKEND
BRIEFING
Ones to watch
Manchester City host
Liverpool at the Etihad
with a one-point lead over
their rivals. With only seven
games remaining after
tomorrow, this could be the
title decider.
Tomorrow, 4.30pm, Sky SportsThe 86th Masters
reaches its final round
at Augusta National. Sungjae
Im, Cameron Smith and
Dustin Johnson made the
early running, but how will
England’s Danny Willett fare?
Tomorrow, 6.30pm, Sky Sp GolfGuess the star
Name this bearded football
player, born in September
1986, who has won the World
Cup and the Champions
League.
He has played for clubs in
England, France and Italy.
Answer on page 21Australian GP
Charles Leclerc and Max
Verstappen won the opening
races of the season with
Mercedes well off the pace.
Can Lewis Hamilton and
George Russell improve in
Melbourne?
Tomorrow, 6am, Sky Sports F1Guess the season
Chelsea are runners-up in the
Premier League, Champions
League and League Cup; the
Euro co-hosts both fall at the
group stage; the FA Cup
semi-finals contain only one
top-flight club.
Answer on page 13On the box
TODAY
12.30pm Everton v
Manchester United, Premier
League BT Sport 1, talkSPORT
3pm Royal Challengers
Bangalore v Mumbai Indians,
IPL Sky Sports Cricket
5.30pm Exeter Chiefs v
Munster, Champions Cup
BT Sport 3TOMORROW
1pm Montpellier v
Harlequins, Champions Cup
BT Sport 3
2.30pm Tottenham Hotspur
v Chelsea, Women’s Super
League BBC iPlayer
3.15pm Clermont Auvergne v
Leicester Tigers, Champions
Cup BT Sport 3“Destroy your idols!” So demanded the
man with the ‘Jesus Car’ parked outside
the Augusta National’s white picket
gates. All at the opening round of the
Masters had flatly ignored that advice
as Tiger Woods’ latest comeback added
to his legend, but after the doffing of
caps, the second day was one for hold-
ing onto your hats and escaping from
this windswept vista with hope and a
prayer. And after only five holes the
fans’ idol was destroying his own belief
in miracles.
The committee men believe nobody
is more important than the course at
Augusta. Not even Woods. His revival
at 46, after five back operations and the
surgery to save his right leg following
his car crash 14 months ago, has been
remarkable, but reality outmuscled
hype as clouds blotted the blue sky.
There was good, bad and ugly, but not
necessarily in that order. He was light-
ing fires and fighting foibles. As Camer-
on Smith had said the previous night, it
was hard to take your eyes off him.
Starting only three off the lead, his
first tee shot found the crater-like fair-
way bunker. That led to a dropped shot
and he was back to level par. He parred
the next but fluffed an approach. Then
he missed the green on the par-three
4th. His tee shot on the 5th was hideous
and fan-threatening. He dropped four
shots in those five holes and the king of
comebacks needed another. Luckily, he
is good at them. So he birdied the 8th
and then played a sumptuous approach
into the 10th to get the fans going. The
man in the ‘Jesus Car’ probably went
home as the roars cleared the fence.
Augusta can be benign but this was
the sabre-toothed version. Kudos, then,
to Charl Schwartzel. It is 11 years since
he won the green jacket thanks to bird-
ies on the final four holes and Rory
McIlroy’s cabin fever meltdown, but his
round of 69 set the standard on a day
when standing still could be considered
progress. Overnight leader Sungjae Im
joined the South African at three under
par after his 74, and it shows the scale of
both the task and trauma being en-
dured elsewhere that he will have been
happy enough to have dropped only
two strokes. As Schwartzel said: “Par is
a great score in those conditions.” Or as
Lee Westwood put it: “There are a lot of
smelly shots out there.”
So many good players struggled but
Scottie Scheffler was not among them.
The world No 1, one of the late starters,
had edged himself into the lead at four
under by the turn, but the lack of low
scores means most of the survivors will
feel they are not out of it. Certainly,
Matt Fitzpatrick, the Yorkshireman
who once branded the Bryson De-
Chambeau obsession with distance as
“a bit daft”, could be around for the long
haul at level par, and Shane Lowry, the
2019 Open champion, was never likely
to be ruffled by a bit of wind and made
headway. DeChambeau, meanwhile,
was 10 over with six to play.
Im, only 24 from South Korea, has
experienced much this week, from the
family fun of his father’s wonder-shot in
the par-three tournament to setting the
pace in the real thing. Then there was
Danny Willett, who found himself in
the outright lead after four holes of his
second round. The Englishman said it
used to get to him when Americans dis-
missed his 2016 Masters victory as a
flash in the pan. His subsequent descentTwo days before the 2021 PGA Champi-
onship on the Ocean Course at Kiawah
Island last May, Jon Rahm was chatting
with reporters about his enthusiasm for
the Tokyo Olympics. He couldn’t wait
to get there. Someone then talked about
how important they were for the Korea
player Im Sung-jae, who needed to win
a medal in Tokyo to avoid compulsory
military conscription.
“Seriously?” asked Rahm.
South Korea law decrees that all men
between 18 and 28 must serve two years
in the military. Exemptions are granted
only to those sports people who win an
Olympic medal or a gold medal at the
Asian Games. Alas for pro golfers, the
Asian Games golf tournament is ama-
teur only. Sung-jae is now 24 and, as
things stand, army duty is imminent.Im proves he responds
David
Walsh
AugustaSomewhat taken aback that he didn’t
know about this, Rahm lightened the
moment with humour. “Well,” he said.
“I would say if we’re fighting for fourth
and third place in Tokyo, I’m open for
bribing if he needs me to make a three-
putt on the last hole. We can always talk
about it. I like Korean food.”
Rahm wasn’t unaware of the serious-
ness of the situation. “I feel for him that
those are the choices, either win a
medal or do military service because
even if you end up in the nicest branch
of the military it’s still one or two years
he can’t play golf. That’s a big setback.”
Asked about having to suspend his
career for time in the army, Im prefers
to move onto the next question. By
talking about it, he draws attention to it.
People ask if KJ Choi and YE Yang, the
two best Korean players before, did mil-
itary service. They did. And two years
after winning the 2013 Byron Nelson
Championship, Sangmoon Bae left the
PGA Tour to do his army stint. He re-
turned in 2017, but has not regained his
pre-Army form. Im is potentially the
greatest-ever Korean player. Perhapsmachine he has been for five years. A
grumpy Jon Rahm had ended his open-
ing round saying he was “pissed off”
after suffering four mudballs. That was
the mood music for many, but Rahm is
at two over, along with Westwood,
McIlroy, Tyrell Hatton and Bob MacIn-
tyre, with one foot in the mix.
When Dustin Johnson, one of the
game’s big hitters, left his driver in the
bag, you knew Augusta was beginning
to bite. Johnson set the scoring record
at the Masters when it was damp and
clingy in November 2020, but was in
danger of sliding away yesterday. It was
time to dig deep and cling on by the fin-
gertips. He was another happy enough
with a round of 73.
It had been mind boggling to think
only nine players could score better
than a middle-aged man with no form
or competition but a near-death experi-
ence in his recent past. Not that every-
one has been seduced by the ebb and
flow of Woods’s week. Michael John-
son, the Olympic idol, tweeted. “Amaz-
es me how Tiger is able to consistently
keep media focused only on the come-
backs from his mishaps when he refuses
to talk to them about the actual mis-
haps.” That is a fair point. Flawed and
brilliant might sum up this Masters idol,
both this week and beyond.Justin Rose and Jason Kokrak
competed for the coveted prize of
most outlandish shirt on day two.
Rose, the two-times runner-up, wore
a floral tribute to Augusta’s Azaleas,
while Kokrak paraded a blend of
limes and umbrellas. Better to do it
on Friday than when putting on the
Green Jacket for the first time.Who said golf
was fashionable?Rick
BroadbentAugustaScheffler stands firm as
Woods plays a
recovery shot on
the fifth; Willett, top
right, and Scheffler,
far right, flourishedwas brutal but this was restorative stuff,
although he faded on the back nine.
He was not the only person taking us
back to 2016. On that occasion Jordan
Spieth infamously collapsed at the 12th,
twice finding the water as he stuttered
to a startling seven. Think Greg Nor-
man in waders. Yesterday the Texan
experienced a nauseating sense of déjà
vu. It will have been scant consolation
to have escaped from another two trips
to the drink with only a six.
Another well-paced figure was
Harold Varner III, a rare black face in a
mainly monochrome sport, and quite a
character. He has given interviews by
the medium of glove puppetry, spoken
of a love of gambling and said golfers
can be the dullest of people. It would do
much for the diversity of the sport if this
African-American maverick could win
here. In his first Masters, Varner was
one off the lead by the time he finished.
So many players have disappointed
in the first two rounds. Xander Schauf-
fele was nine off the lead after 27 holes;
Justin Thomas was nine behind after 18
but then made a fist of things. Brooks
Koepka looked anything but the major