Jordan Spieth has voiced concerns the Old Course at St Andrews could prove too easy a challenge for the world’s best players when the ‘home of golf’ stages next week’s 150th Open.
The American will be bidding for a second Open title to add to the one he won at Royal Birkdale near Liverpool five years ago.
There have long been fears that a combination of modern golf club and ball technology, allied to the greater fitness of present-day players, leaves many classic links or coastal courses that stage the Open increasingly defenceless against a barrage of low scoring unless the weather comes to their aid.
Asked if the Old Course might be “too easy”, Spieth, who just missed out on a playoff at the 2015 Open at St Andrews, northeast of Edinburgh, replied: “Yeah, I think it might be.”
“It’s hard for me to tell given in 2015 we had so much wind that we couldn’t even play. But I think if it’s like it was this morning out here, it’s just a wedge contest, really.
“It was not necessarily built for today’s technology but I think that even a nice 10 to 15 miles an hour wind would do something to it and the fact that it doesn’t look like we are going to get any rain, so I think the defence could be how fast it plays.”
The 28-year-old, a three-time Major champion, added: “It could get like Muirfield was in 2013, and I think that regardless of wind conditions, that would change the golf course significantly and make it challenging to hold fairways and greens.”
© Agence France-Presse
