TIGER WOODS, IAN POULTER BIG-NAME CASUALTIES ON DAY ONE

FROM THE DAILY TELEGRAPH WEBSITE
By KEVIN GARSIDE
It was always the dream of Ian Poulter to be bracketed with Tiger Woods. Not like this. Woods and Poulter were the highest profile victims of golf’s knock out punch on the opening day at the Accenture Match Play Championship in Tucson, Arizona.
Woods, a three-time winner of this title, and Poulter, the defending champion, were poleaxed at the first extra hole by opponents packing integrity if not profile. Step forward Thomas Bjorn and Stewart Cink, cheerleaders for golf’s great unheralded.
Poulter, who was two up with four to play, had some claim to bad luck. Woods was simply beaten by the better man on day day. Asked where he stood after another poor outcome in his third event of the year, Woods replied “pissed”, which in the American lexicon translates as disappointed.
Poulter reached for the same adjective to describe his emotions. Well, he is a resident of Florida.
Poulter’s frustration was rooted in opportunities missed. Woods was raging at the state of his game in the midst of another painful swing reconstruction.
“I had momentum going to the 19th hole and I blew it,” Woods said. “I missed a putt on 17 that I should hole every time.” Ifs and putts.
Poulter was battling himself from the off. As defending champion he was unhappy to be out first, just half an hour after sun up. Frost delayed the opening by 30 minutes to compound his frustration. At the sixth he had murder in his mind as the cameramen in the TV gantry at the back of the green prattled away on his takeaway.
Despite all of this, Poulter went ahead at the seventh, doubled his advantaged at the tenth and had a putt for the match on the last and still could not put Cink away.
“I really should have shut the match out. If you don’t hole the putts in this format you get punished. He putted me out of the match,” Poulter said.
Dove Mountain, Arizona, is in no sense a Celtic Manor.
For those prepared to brave the clock and the temperatures while waiting for Woods to tee it up in the civilised noon sunshine, there was much to admire in the dawn setting. No golf club, never mind one as pretty as this, has any business blooming in the arid, desert landscape.
Thank heaven someone was mad enough to throw enough soil down to thread 18 holes around the cacti and enough money down to water them. This was once the domain of indigenous American champion Geronimo and the Apache, and latterly has been given a heightened literary value in the austere novels of Cormack McCarthy.
Miles and miles of breathtaking nothingness stretches across the plain south to Tucson and on over the mountains to the Mexican border.
For one week only it is the territory of the world’s top 64 golfers. Poulter apart it was a good day for Europe’s Ryder Cup headliners. Luke Donald, playing only his second event of the year, was almost home by the turn.
Charley Hoffman was largely responsible for the lopsided score card, posting five bogeys on the outward nine to trail Donald by six holes.
The match was over on the 13th green with Donald, the victor by 6 and 5, the first in for lunch. “I like to win it pretty easily,” Donald said. No kidding, Luke.
Another enjoying a fine morning was Graeme McDowell. The US Open champion was coming off a month-long sojourn in the Florida sunshine. Athletes call it productive rest.

Despite dropping the first hole to a bogey, he was four up after seven and ran out a winner 4 and 3.

Ross Fisher progressed by the same margin against Robert Allenby, Rory McIlroy was a 4 and 2 winner against Jonathan Byrd and Lee Westwood accounted for Henrik Stenson 3 and 2.

Though Martin Kaymer smashed Seung-Yul Noh 7 and 6, Europe’s most impressive performer was arguably Matteo Manassero, the 17 year-old spoiling Steve Stricker’s 44th birthday on the 17th green. Poulter was already in the departure lounge at Tucson Airport when Manassero shook hands with Stricker.

As well-schooled Ryder Cup watchers will know, Cink is a golfing barnacle. As they say in these parts, he has no quit in him. A birdie at the 13th reduced the deficit to one and, after conceding the 14th to go two down again, another birdie at the 15th reduced the gap once more.

This is what makes the match play format so compelling, blokes like Cink clinging to hope with their teeth.

Trying to cut the corner off the dog-leg 17th, Cink found sand. His escape also landed in a bunker. Poulter was short with his second, played a poor chip and had no cameramen to blame. Though Cink was long out of the bunker he had a ten footer to square the match with one to play. The barnacle was all over it.
Resuits in draw order:

FIRST-ROUND


BOBBY JONES BRACKET
L Westwood bt H Stenson 3 and 2.
N Watney bt A Kim 5 and 4.
K Choi bt R Goosen 1 hole.
R Moore bt F Molinari 3 and 1.
M Manassero bt S Stricker 2 and 1.
C Schwartzel bt R Ishikawa at 20th.
L Donald bt C Hoffman 6 and 5.
E Molinari bt M Laird 3 and 2.


BEN HOGAN BRACKET
P Mickelson bt B Jones 6 and 5.
R Fowler bt P Hanseon 1 hole.
M Kuchar bt A Hansen at 22nd.
B Van Pelt bt L Oosthuizen 2 holes.
G McDowell bt H Slocum 4 and 3.
R Fisher bt R Allenby 4 and 3.
S Cink bt I Poulter at 19th.
Y Yang bt A Quiros at 20th.


GARY PLAYER BRACKET
M Kaymer bt S Noh 7 and 6.
J Rose bt Z Johnson 2 and 1.
R Karlsson bt H Fujita 5 and 3.
H Mahan bt S O'Hair 4 and 3.
R McIlroy bt J Byrd 4 and 2.
B Crane bt A Scott 4 and 2.
R Palmer bt J Furyk 2 holes.
M Jimenez bt Y Ikeda 2 and 1.

SAM SNEAD BRACKET
T Bjorn bt T Woods at 19th.
G Ogilvy bt P Harrington 4 and 3.
M Wilson bt D Johnson at 19th.
B Watson bt B Haas 3 and 2.
P Casey bt R Green at 19th.
J Day bt K Kim 3 and 2.
E Els bt J Overton at 19th.
J B Holmes bt C Villegas 4 and 2.