'Triple Double' appeals to Watson at his adopted home

TOM Watson has achieved so much in his career – eight majors, five senior majors and 39 US PGA Tour wins – that it was hardly surprising to learn the five-time Open champion was only a little intrigued yesterday by the notion of completing "The Triple Double" at Royal Troon.

Since becoming eligible for the Senior Open in 1999, Watson has twice won titles in Scotland on links where he previously won the Open. Watson followed in the footsteps of Bob Charles when he won the Open and the Senior Open at the same venue after clinching victory at Turnberry in 2003, the scene of his most illustrious major success in 1977 over Jack Nicklaus.

Last summer he emulated that achievement at Muirfield, the East Lothian links where he also triumphed in the 1980 Open. Now, if Watson can win the Senior Open at Troon and match his Open success at the Ayrshire links in 1982, he'll complete a unique treble.

"Winning here (before] gives me an advantage of understanding the golf course and how it plays in the wind," the American recalled yesterday. "If I can remember what happened back then, winning for a third time in a different venue would be nice, but I don't think about that.

"I just think about the golf course and how it played before. I'm just here to play a golf tournament and try to remember where to aim the ball. Like yesterday in the pro-am, I was trying to learn how to hit the ball, where to hit the ball.

"Where do you hit the ball on the tenth, a blind shot; where do you hit the ball at 11, the Railway Hole, what club do you hit? Those things are coming back to me, and formulating my game plan. That's what I'm thinking about, not so much about winning a triple double. Of course that would be nice and it makes a good line. I understand where you're going there. But I'm pretty simple when it comes to these things. I'm just trying to win a golf tournament."

There's more feeling for Watson in Scotland than almost anywhere else in the world of golf. He has won seven of his 13 regular and senior major titles in Scotland and established a rapport with the galleries at the game's home only matched by Nicklaus.

"I think it's fair to say I also have an affection for the Scots, even though I also won at Royal Birkdale in 1983. In Scotland there is a fabric of golf. People who don't even play the game in this country have an appreciation of golf and its history."

Paired with Greg Norman and Sandy Lyle, Watson believes the level of competition on the senior tour is stronger than it's ever been and knows he'll need to reach a high standard if he wants to bag his eighth major on the Scottish linksland.

"Level of competition?" he pondered. "Well, you can say the man who almost won the Open is playing here this week, so the level of competition is very high. You have Bernhard Langer, who is a wonderful player. Andy Bean is probably the dark horse. Andy can really play. He's played well over here over the years, in Open championships. There's a name you might want to put a few quid on. The secret's out now."

Like actors, who fear bad luck and shy away from naming Macbeth, instead referring to Shakespeare's tragedy as 'The Scottish Play', most golfers are reluctant to use the word shank when they hit a shot which flies straight right off the club face. Watson harbours no such superstitions and mentioned the 's' word 13 times yesterday when he discussed the negative impact of the ageing process on his game.

The 58-year-old from Kansas admitted: "I'm shanking the ball more than I used to and I'm trying to hit little pitch shots with an open face. It doesn't surprise me when I shank it. I hit three shanks last year and I think I've had one shank this year.

"I never had a shank before; actually, I did. I was playing with Gary Player and I had a shank at the Canadian Open, a beautiful high shank into the adjoining fairway and then I hit a pitching wedge up on the green and made about a 20-footer for par. But those things happen.

" You hit a lot stranger shots the older you get. But I can accept that. I think I understand. It's life in the present. You don't look back in the past. People ask me, 'do you ever look at your tapes of your old championships'; the answer is no, I don't do that."

While most club golfers will take heart from the knowledge someone as gifted as Watson can also hit a shank, it's the reaction to that confidence-sapping shot which distinguishes an Open champion. At the tournament he organises in Kansas, Watson hit a shank earlier this year. Instead of pressing the panic button, however, the great man saved par.

"Driver, 5 iron, shank, sand wedge, putt," he grinned. "That's the way you write it down. And it still only counts for five…"

TEE TIMES

Senior Open Championship first round at Troon today (USA unless stated)

0710 Antonio Garrido (Spa), Bill Mccoll (Sco), Robert Fox (Eng)

0720 Ronnie Black, Steve Prendergast (Irl), John Hoskison (Eng)

0730 Denis Durnian (Eng), John McTear (Sco), Steve Stull

0740 Terry Gale (Aus), Buddy Harston, Gary Hallberg

0750 Clarence Rose, Martin Poxon (Eng), James Chancey

0800 Jim Lapsley (NZ), Arthur Pierse (Irl), Tommy Horton (Eng)

0810 Bob Boyd, Martin Gray (Eng), Yutaka Hagawa (Eng)

0820 Donnie Hammond, Kiyoshi Murota (Jpn), David Merriman (Aus)

0830 Bruce Vaughan, Angel Franco (Par), David A Russell (Eng)

0840 Isao Aoki (Jpn), Ross Drummond (Sco), Gary Player (SA)

0850 Scott Simpson, Peter Mitchell (Eng), Katsuyoshi Tomori (Jpn)

0900 Wayne Grady (Aus), Costantino Rocca (Ita), John Cook

0920 Sandy Lyle (Sco), Tom Watson, Greg Norman (Aus)

0930 Mark McNulty (Irl), Carl Mason (Eng), Craig Stadler

0940 Jose Rivero (Spa), Bob Charles (NZ), T C Chen (Tpe)

0950 Eamonn Darcy (Irl), Vicente Fernandez (Arg), Luis Carbonetti (Arg)

1000 Bob Gilder, Jerry Bruner, Ken Green

1010 Philip Blackmar, Manuel Pinero (Spa), Mike Reid

1020 Andrew Hall (Eng), Giuseppe Cali (Ita), Ron Streck

1030 Tim Conley, Maurice Bembridge (Eng), Stewart Graham (Eng)

1040 Ossie Moore (Aus), Seiji Ebihara (Jpn), Jeff Hall (Eng)

1050 John Ross, Bertus Smit (SA), Craig Maltman (Sco)

1100 David Downie (Sco), Noel Ratcliffe (Aus), Adam Adams

1110 Bruce Heuchan, Phil Hinton (Eng), J A Fraser (Sco)

1130 Ray Carrasco, Jimmy Heggarty (NIrl), Jon Chaffee

1140 Mike Gallagher (Eng), Peter Teravainen, Paul J McKellar (Sco)

1150 Andrew Reynolds (Eng), Mike Goodes, Torsten Giedeon (Ger)

1200 Kirk Hanefeld, Shigenori Mori (Jpn), Denis O'Sullivan (Irl)

1210 Tom McKnight, Horacio Carbonetti (Arg), Andrew Murray (Eng)

1220 John Morse, John Chillas (Sco), Harumitsu Hamano (Jpn)

1230 Guillermo Encina (Chi), Gene Jones, Jimmy Blair

1240 Pete Oakley, John Bland (SA), Mike Hulbert

1250 David Ogrin, Bob Cameron (Eng), Nobumitsu Yuhara (Jpn)

1300 Bill Longmuir (Sco), Mark Wiebe, Stewart Ginn (Aus)

1310 Joey Sindelar, Domingo Hospital (Spa), Gordon J Brand (Eng)

1320 Juan Quiros (Spa), Jeff Sluman, Tim Simpson

1340 Ian Woosnam (Wal), Mark O'Meara, Bernhard Langer (Ger)

1350 Eduardo Romero (Arg), Sam Torrance (Sco), Tom Kite

1400 Scott Hoch, Des Smyth (Irl), Tony Johnstone (Zim)

1410 Mark James (Eng), Andy Bean, Nick Job (Eng)

1420 David J Russell (Eng), Gary Koch, Simon Owen (Aus)

1430 Bobby Lincoln (SA), Adrian Morrow (Irl), Bill Lockie (Sco)

1440 Ian Brotherston (Sco), John Harris, Tomohiro Maruyama (Jpn)

1450 Tony Allen (Eng), Steve Martin (Sco), Brady Exber

1500 Joel Hirsch, Tim Giles (Eng), Jim Rhodes (Eng)

1510 J P Morgan (Eng), Peter Dahlberg (Swe), Motomasa Aoki (Jpn)

1520 Tony Price (Wal), David Good, Niall Lavin (Irl)

1530 Robin Clark (Eng), Mike Williams (Zim), Gordon Townhill (Eng)