Rory McIlroy sent brutal 7-word response to Bryson DeChambeau after Masters row

Daily Mirror

a day ago

Rory McIlroy was paired with Bryson DeChambeau for the final round at Augusta, but the Northern Irishman refused to speak to the American as he focused on his own game
Rory McIlroy will be back in Major game mode when he takes to the first tee at Oakmont Country Club for the US Open this weekend. McIlroy completed the career Grand Slam of Majors by winning the Masters in April and is aiming for another success in Pennsylvania.
The Northern Irishman's dramatic triumph in Augusta earlier this year contained an interesting sub-plot involving American star Bryson DeChambeau. McIlroy was paired with DeChambeau during the final round at Augusta and eyebrows were raised when the American revealed that the champion 'didn't talk to me once all day.'
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DeChambeau sounded hurt by the snubbing, which hinted at a falling out between two of the sport's biggest stars. But speaking at Quail Hollow, ahead of the PGA Championship, McIlroy brushed off any criticism that had come his way.
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'I don't know what he was expecting," he said bluntly. "We're trying to win the Masters. I'm not going to try to be his best mate out there.
'Look, everyone approaches the game in different ways. Yeah, like I was focused on myself and what I needed to do. That's really all that it was. It wasn't anything against him or against – it's just I felt that's what I needed to do to try to get the best out of myself that day.'
DeChambeau has also tried to dampen any talk of a beef. Speaking in April, he said: "He was just being stoic the whole day; there was nothing more. I was like, he just didn't talk to me. It wasn't a slight; there's no beef or anything.
"It was like what Tiger [Woods] did to Tony [Finau back in 2019]. It's the same combo, but it wasn't meant to be in a bad way, and that's how things happen. I wish people would not interpret things, but, you know, people will do that."
McIlroy may have banished his Grand Slam demons at Augusta earlier this year, but he arrives at Oakmont in a tricky place. A change of driver has caused some issues for the 36-year-old, who missed the cut at the Canadian Open after struggling to find the fairway.
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'Of course it concerns me. You don't want to shoot high scores like the one I did today," he said in Toronto. "I felt like I came here with a new driver thinking that was going to be good and solve some of the problems off the tee, but it didn't.
'Going to Oakmont next week, what you need to do more than anything else there is hit fairways. Still searching for the missing piece off the tee. When I get that part of the game clicking, then everything falls into place for me. Right now that isn't.'
He added: 'Even though the last two days didn't go the way I wanted them to, there's still things I can take from it and still things I can learn. I'm going to have to do a lot of practice, a lot of work over the weekend at home and try to at least have a better idea of where my game is going into next week.'