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Tiger Woods

Tiger Woods cut a rather terse and uncomfortable figure when addressing journalists in a press conference at the JP McManus Pro-Am event at Adare Manor on Tuesday. The world number one, making his first appearance in front of the British and Irish media since the damaging revelations broke about his private life at the end of last year, was rather more forthcoming when quizzed about on-course matters and the upcoming Open Championship, but met queries about his private life with silences or short answers.

Amongst the questions he fielded, the 34-year-old was asked by one journalist whether his off-course misdeaminours had been worthwhile given his recent poor form and his current familial predicament, to which he responded: "I think you are reading too deep into this."

When asked why he would not be practising any links golf before next week's Open at St Andrews, Woods replied: "Because I need to go home." When the reporter then asked if that was due to "personal stuff" Woods glared before abruptly answering: "To see my kids."

He then acknowledged that he had come to see golf as somewhat more trivial than in the past as a result of his ongoing problems, stating: "Golf is something that I've done for a very long time and there are times in one's life when things are put in perspective; one being when my father passed and what I've been going through lately."

However, he was more at ease when questioned about St Andrews and the state of his game. Despite finishing way down in 46th in last week's AT&T National, he commented: "I feel like I made some pretty good strides last week, I drove the ball great, but just putted terrible and consequently I finished way down the board.

"But I'll work on it, I'll work hard on my lag putting and make sure that's organised - there's a lot of really long lag-putts at St Andrews. I'm really looking forward to getting there and competing.

"I hurt myself early (after coming back) and that kind of put a damper on things, but I feel like I'm right on pace. Normally this is about April in the amount of tournaments I've played, so that's about right.

"I look forward to major championships. The only one that came really fast this year was the Masters, I had just a few weeks to prepare. But we're in the major championship flow now, they come once a month now. Once the Masters hits we've got a big event every month so you're into that mode."

Speaking of St Andrews, a course he confessed was his favourite test in golf, he added: "In '95 my introduction to links golf was Carnoustie, which hosted the Scottish Open that year, and then St Andrews - that's as good as it gets for your introduction to links golf.

"I just fell in love with it (St Andrews). The lies and angles, it's not what everyone says it is, people say you can hit it miles left, you can hit it miles left but you've got no angle.

"And the R&A always sets up the pins really well so it forces you to be more creative how you play the golf course. Your touch has to be great because you're going to have a lot of long lag-putts that break three or four directions.

"It takes a lot of imagination and when you look at the past champions at St Andrews, a lot of them have great short games and a great imagination and ball control. I think it's just a fantastic golf course and what genius it took to lay it out that way." Source – Skysports.com

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