Sport360° view: McIlroy needs to get to grips with personal life to put golf back on course

Joy Chakravarty 11:53 22/05/2014
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  • Rory McIlroy’s turbulent life lurches from one disaster to another.

    The latest upheaval was the news yesterday that he has broken up his engagement with tennis star Caroline Wozniacki.

    Without being privy to what happened between them, it would be pointless to comment on anything else, except for the fact that with so many things happening to McIlroy over the past couple of years, he really needs to get a grip on his life before he can focus on what’s going wrong with his golf.

    It all started with what many considered an ill-timed move to change his management company from Chubby Chandler’s ISM to Horizon Sports.

    He then fell apart with Horizon’s Conor Ridge and has entered into a protracted and ugly court battle with them.

    Finally, he started his own management company to look after his business affairs.

    People spoke of how good an environment ISM created around him and, of course, Horizon was able to negotiate what has been termed by many as the biggest individual contract in sport – the $200 million, 10-year deal with Nike.

    Obviously, McIlroy still felt he was not getting 100 per cent.

    With Wozniacki, there were strong rumours last year of a fall-out.

    But they got engaged in fairytale-like fashion, with McIlroy proposing on a yacht on New Year’s Eve in Sydney Harbour.

    Break-ups happen, but to develop cold feet a couple of days after sending out wedding invitations was terrible timing on the part of McIlroy.

    What he needs to realise is that other people can hurt his interests, but he can always come back from that.

    It’s a lot more difficult situation when the wounds are self-inflicted.

    Not only has he got to make the right decisions, he also needs to make them at the right time.

    And while he was candid in proclaiming the “problem was mine”, it is imperative that if he is to live up to his much vaunted status of being the next legend in world golf, he has to become a lot smarter and decisive.

    And that applies not just to his golf game, but also to life away from the golf course.

    The legendary Bobby Jones once famously said that “golf is a game played on a five-inch course – the distance between your ears”, and that space is in a constant state of upheaval in McIlroy’s case.

    Earlier in the year in Abu Dhabi, when he had slipped to No6 in the world, McIlroy was able to joke about his ‘so-called fall’ in rankings from No1.

    He has now slipped to No10 and with him defending so many points from his brilliant second half of 2012, it will be a slide from here on if he cannot plug the leaks.

    The only positive to come out of the whole situation was McIlroy’s willingness to bring it out in the open so soon, and not sit brooding on it.

    But what the 25-year-old desperately needs at the moment is sound advice and he could do worse than sit with someone trustworthy like Paul McGinley – somebody who has the wisdom of age, is a top-level golfer to understand that part of McIlroy’s life, and who will not try to benefit commercially from the relationship.

    If he can put his personal problems behind him, given his enormous talent, sorting out his golf will be easy.

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