Tiger Woods had a day he would best rather forget in the appropriately named (from his point of view anyway) Waste Management Phoenix Open, carding an abysmal round of 82 to not only miss the cut, but also lie last in the field of 132 players after two rounds. He will play no further part in the tournament over the weekend, after shooting an error-strewn eighteen holes that left him eleven shots over the par for the course of 71, hence making the performance the worst during his professional career thus far.
Woods gave his repaired teeth their first competitive 'outing' in Phoenix, after he had lost one of them and cracked another while watching his girlfriend ski in Italy.
Lindsey Vonn was racing in an event in the European country with Woods in attendance, when the golfer was struck in the face by a camera.
The event in Phoenix continues into the weekend for the remaining two rounds for those that survived the cut, with Scottish golfer Martin Laird leading after thirty-six holes on ten under par, a far cry from the plight of the fourteen-time major winner. For 39-year-old Woods it is a case of back to the drawing board, although he didn't seem too despondent about it when quizzed afterwards for an explanation of his poor round, as he competed in his first event of the season on the prestigious PGA Tour. After a two-round massively sub-standard thirteen over par total, he preferred to avoid an overreaction and claimed: "I've got to keep this in perspective.
Sometimes that's hard to do."
The former number one must be glancing enviously at the current form of the man who has replaced him at the top, Rory McIlroy, who has finished second in his last three events and in stark contrast to Woods, sits at the top of the pile after two rounds of the Dubai Desert Classic. Following on from a relatively calm day in Dubai, where McIlroy bemoaned the benign conditions that made scoring almost too easy on day one, he was in sparkling form to record an eight-under par score of 64 in round two for a score of 14 under.
It was near faultless golf from the Irishman, as besides eight successful birdies, he also failed to convert other opportunities to improve his card. He will not be complaining too much though, after taking a one-shot lead at half-way over the Scot Marc Warren. McIlroy's compatriot Graeme McDowell shares third place with Englishman Seve Benson on 12-under par, with a group of players including Lee Westwood a further shot behind them. Benson's interesting first name is in homage to the late, great Seve Ballesteros, who he was named after.