Ernie Els eyes a strong comeback at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship
The reigning Open champion Ernie Els hopes to return to his winning form, when he tees off at this week’s European Tour’s Alfred Dunhill Links Championship.
The South African made a strong charge on the leaderboard at Lytham & St Annes, in the final round of the 2012 Open Championship, and outshined Adam Scott to claim the fourth major title of his career.
Right after his victory, he lost his form and has not finished among the top-20s in any of the tournaments that he played since then.
The very next tournament that he played after his win was the RBC Canadian Open. He was among the hot favourites to win that tournament because of his recent form at that time. However, he missed the cut after signing his scorecard with rounds of 72 and
70.
He then participated in the World Golf Championships - Bridgestone Invitational and the PGA Championship. Yet again, he performed poorly and finished outside the top-40s in each of the two tournaments.
Afterwards, he decided to compete in the US PGA Tour Playoffs and made it to the final leg of the one-month swing – the Tour Championship.
Yet, it was not because of his consistent performances during the playoffs. In fact, he made it to the final stage, thanks to his major title victory in July.
His best finish during the race to FedEx Cup came in the Deutsche Bank Championship where he tied for the 26th position.
According to the 42-year-old, his return to the Old Course at St Andrews will allow him to earn back his form on the European Tour.
“It’s great to be back,” he said. “Nice to see the sun shining. I haven't played links obviously since July, so I'm really looking forward to catching up with friends and hopefully playing good golf. It seems like I've been busy ever since then [The Open]”.
He added, “This is my job, but sometimes you just need a little bit of time off and I would love to have had that week off. But then to the PGA and then to the FedEx Cup golf tournaments, and I just haven't really had time to really reflect”.
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