The 2022 Masters will not be a walk for world number 1 Scottie Scheffler, who will have to fight thoroughly in the assault on the first major of his career. The 25-year-old boy and his experienced squire Ted Scott, in the bag – he was the caddy with the Bubba Watson who won the two green jackets – have found an adversary in the Australian Cameron Smith, who on a cold Saturday, with strong gusts of wind , which is what drives golfers the most, repeated the 68 on Thursday to stay three shots behind the Texan.
It is the fight that rarely throws this sport. The two fittest players face off. The best of 2022, Scheffler, three wins; in front of the golfer whose ponytail stirs the guts of the conservative associates in the green jacket who don’t know whether to call the tailor or the barber before his arrival. They have been the most electric of this Masters: 17 birdies for the American; 16, Smith. “It’s going to be a formidable fight,” the leader announced. In the third plane, without ruling it out, is the Korean Sungjae Im, five shots away.
It was a day of hard movement, which cheered up the sun already at sunset, but very cold during the morning. The golfers’ bags were filled with winter material: woolen hats, polar mittens the size of barbecues, all except Sergio García, who has too many clothes even though he’s cold on the course and doesn’t take his hands out of his pockets .
only seven under par
The Masters is a tricky tournament. A golf version of the game of squid, even in the staging with cameras on the pins that record any shot, a high-altitude drone and chips on accreditation. On Thursday, after the first day, there were 18 players under par, which was reduced to 15 on Friday. After the slaughter of the third day only 7 remained. Harold Varner III, proud of his -1 when he was fifth, threw 80 shots; Patrick Cantlay 79; Tiger, 78 and Rahm and Niemann, 77. The Augusta National was played at 74.5 average shots, a very high average for a Saturday.
After the first third, Scheffler seemed to have it done. I was playing well, very safe. Four birdies in eight holes. Insulting leadership. Six shots up when he hit 10 under par. Colleagues assume their peak moment. “If he plays close to the level he has been playing all year, there is little to do,” Sergio said.
But this did not happen and entering the Amen Corner, the clairvoyance of his game darkened. He began to trip, very easy with the wind that was blowing, to miss blows. To add bogeys, remedied with some birdie. An hour earlier Smith had drawn a different graph: in the critical moments with that short game that Herbert defines as “disgustingly good” he had made five birdies and was already resting with his 68.
Scheffler felt the pressure on the 18th. Wanting to get around the trees on the right to which he had gone on Friday a gust of wind, the last treacherous one of the day, sank his ball into the thickest pines on the left. “For a moment I thought we weren’t going to find the ball,” he admitted. Forced to drop, he fell for the fourth bogey in seven holes.
Augusta will have to choose a champion between the traditional, good boy, great student and Christian or the rocker from Brisbane who didn’t wait until he was 20 to turn professional and who has a hairdresser named after a golf legend: Lee Trevino. Almost that he wants the second more.
