Abu Dhabi: World No 3 Henrik Stenson began this weekend’s Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship as the highest-ranked player at the National Course and with a lot expected of him.
Having won the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai in November last year to seal victory in the European Tour’s season-long Race to Dubai money list — to go alongside his triumph the US equivalent, the FedEx Cup — Swede Stenson had a unique opportunity to start 2014 by completing a ‘Gulf Slam’ with victory here.
However, the 37-year-old’s challenge got tangled in the rough and he missed the cut after being stuck on two-over at the end of the second round on Friday.
“The real problem for me this week was that I didn’t make any birdies on the par fives,” said Stenson, who made 23 cuts on The European Tour in 2013. “The scores on the rest of the holes were not bad.
“The rough was extremely thick and you can’t play any shots out of it. It is disappointing to miss the cut but these things happen.”
The 2013 Open Championship runner-up revealed he was under-prepared for this tournament and that was another reason for his unexpected early exit.
“My preparations were a little bit on the short side,” said Stenson, who won two FedEx Cup play-off events — the Deutsche Bank and the Tour Championship — in 2013. “My striking wasn’t good enough and the course is tough.
“Now I’m just trying to move on and am looking forward to getting some good practice in. In terms of having days off, I think it was six months [since he last missed a cut]. Now I have a day that wasn’t planned and so maybe I can look at it from the bright side and have a day off.”
Stenson, who will now head to Doha for the Qatar Masters, which he won in 2006, added: “In Qatar, you’re coming a little more straight into most of the holes, I would say. This course is one that snakes the most off the tee. You are going to come in at an angle and, when the rough is thick, it makes the fairways narrow.”
