Tiger Woods / Ralph Ellis / 01 February 2011 / Leave a Comment

Tiger's turmoil continued on the weekend with a 44th place finish at a venue, Torrey Pines, where he was previously impregnable. And yet he is still odds on for a major win in 2011, says a shocked Ralph Ellis

On holiday in Spain I once found myself playing what must have been the world's only 13 hole golf course. Unlucky in more ways than one. It wasn't meant to be that way. It had been built, snaking through beautiful orange groves, with 18 challenging holes surrounded by luxury villas.

Sadly for the people who had moved there with promises of a golden retirement the money for maintenance ran out, the developers disappeared, and the only solution had been to leave some of the greens to go wild.

If they are still there, the remaining residents can feel proud of that this morning - or at least compared to the first ever Tiger Woods-designed golfing centre in Dubai. There, it appears, only six holes have been completed on what was meant to be a 1.1billion dollar development. Word is that not only are they abandoning the rest of the plan, but will stop watering what has been built. In six months the desert will take over again.

That's bad news for the people who had already put down deposits to secure the mansions which were designed to overlook the fairways. But it just about sums up how the world of Woods has come crashing down in little more than 12 months since that early hours car accident which blew open the whole charade of his private life.

It seems he's been in therapy, both for his life and his golf swing, ever since. And so far nothing seems to have halted the decline either off or on the course. He's even more surly than ever, this weekend even refusing to answer straightforward questions about his schedule. And after finishing tied in 44th place in the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines there's no sign of his ability to win coming back either.

The man who once intimidated everyone who found themselves drawn to play him was even put in the shade by Venezuala's rising star Jhonattan Vegas.

The only people scared of Tiger now appear to be punters. How else do you explain that, after a year without winning a tournament, he's already been installed as favourite for every single Major of 2011? All logic says that's a bargain chance to lay him, and also to take the near even money [1.95] on offer in Betfair's Tiger Specials market for him to win no Majors at all.

Amazingly he's as short as [5.9] for The Masters, while the man who has taken over as world number one Lee Westwood is [15.0]. Last year's winner Phil Mickelson is nearly twice the price at [10.0]. Paul Casey, who picked up his first trophy of the season by calmly holing an eight foot putt on the last in Bahrain, is [34.0].

All the evidence says the Tiger era is over. Sadly his reality is that, just like that unfinished development in the Dubai desert, he doesn't appear capable any longer of putting more than six good holes together.

Five things you might not know about Jhonattan Vegas
1. Born in the Venezualan capital of Maturin in August 1984, dad Carlos and mum Mauritza did the catering on a nine-hole golf course built for American oil workers.
2. He was four years old when his grandfather taught him to play the game using a broomstick and a rock
3. He left home aged 17 to seek his fortune in North America - his father forbade him from attending a baseball game for fear he would be trampled by the crowds
4. He won a golf scholarship to the University of Texas where a local property developer Dick Kemp became his legal guardian to help subsidise his progress. Kemp has now taken the same role for Jhonattan's younger brother Julio who also plays golf at the University
5. He spoke only ten words of English when first moving to America, but has completed his university degree in Kinesiology, the science of human movement

Post a comment

Name:

Email Address:

URL:

Remember personal info?

Comment: