Dubai: Race to Dubai and DP World Tour Championship holder Rory McIlroy is looking to end 2013 on a high after a forgettable season.
The 24-year-old Northern Irishman scraped into the European Tour’s top 60 — and into this week’s season-ending event at Jumeirah Golf Estates – with a tied-for-sixth place finish at the WGC HSBC Champions in Shanghai earlier this month.
It was only his sixth top-10 finish in a winless 2013 and is in stark contrast to last season when he won five events and topped money-lists on both sides of the Atlantic.
After switching from Titleist to Nike clubs at the start of the year for a reported £78 million (Dh455 million), the double major winner has dropped from first to sixth in the world rankings and is also 46th in the Race to Dubai with no chance of catching leader Henrik Stenson.
With this decline, he has also reportedly split up his Danish tennis-star girlfriend Caroline Wozniacki and entered a bitter legal dispute with his management after they allegedly took £4.7 million from him in commissions. To compound matters, his management are also looking to counter sue him for breaking his five-year contract with them.
“It’s been an interesting year,” said McIlroy. “Obviously a lot of stuff has gone on, on and off the course. But the big thing for me is my game is in really good shape again, and that’s the most important thing.
“I’m still working hard and still trying to get better all the time, but it’s back to a place where I’m comfortable, and to a place where I feel like I can win golf tournaments.”
Of Dubai, where he won his first professional tournament — the Omega Dubai Desert Classic in 2006 — and where he was crowned European No 1 six years later, McIlroy said: “It’s nice to come back to a place like Dubai where I had success last year, and some good memories. So I’m in a good place to try and defend my title this week.
“It’s a little different coming into this week and not having much to play for in terms of the Race to Dubai, but I still want to try and finish the season off really strongly.”
Of his off-course troubles, he said: “As a golfer you want your mind as clear as possible, and it’s obviously hard for that to happen if you’ve got other things that are going on that. Firstly, you don’t want to happen, and secondly you don’t feel should be happening.”
When asked to compare and contrast this season to last, he said: “It’s like polar opposites. I guess I learnt last year how to deal with the hype and people building you up, and this year I’ve learned to deal with the criticism.
“It’s not the place that I want to be in. But it hasn’t been a disastrous year. I’ve played well in patches.
“I haven’t played consistently well. I haven’t given myself as many chances to win as I would have liked. But as I said, my game feels in really good shape and I’ve got a few tournaments left this year to try and put a win on the board.”
