Adam Lawrence reflects on an Open close to offering sport's greatest story.
So: the impossible dream proved to be just that. After spending the whole of the Open weekend declaring 'He can't possibly win', I had finally started to believe that Tom Watson was actually going to roll back the years and match Harry Vardon's six Opens.
Never before have I seen a crowd of tens of thousands so visibly deflated as when Watson missed his putt for the title on Turnberry's eighteenth green. It was as though an entire group of people had bought into the idea of a miracle, and had suddenly been brought back to reality.
Turnberry, though, comes out of the championship triumphantly. No more should the course be criticised for being all about views, not really about great golf, or as too easy a test of golf. Perhaps four or five of the inland holes are not so exciting, but holes such as the brutal fifth and eighth are both picturesque and intriguing. And few courses not designed by Harry Colt have a better set of par threes.
Adam Lawrence