GULLANE, Scotland — Bringing what had already been a testy, frustrating British Open week for a number of players to a the boil on Saturday was a sudden slow-play crackdown by the Royal & Ancient, the Open’s governing body, at Muirfield.
A number of players were put on the clock for slow play and young Japanese star-in-the-making Hideki Matsuyama, who has been in contention all week, was penalized one stroke for slow play.
Matsuyama’s group was put on the clock on the 15th hole because they were 15 minutes over the scheduled time and were out of position with the group ahead of them.
His first bad time was recorded on his first putt on the 15th at one minute, 12 seconds. His second bad time was on his second shot to the 17th hole, which was two minutes, 12 seconds. That resulted in the one-shot penalty applied to his score on No. 16, which became a bogey 6.
Matsuyama, who was 3-under par for his round through 11 holes and 1-under for the tournament, finished with a 3-over-par 72 and is 3-over for the tournament. He bogeyed the 18th hole after being penalized and was 4-over par on his final seven holes.
“Under the situation I think it’s tragic, and I think the R&A should use better judgment in the penalizing of it,’’ Matsuyama’s playing partner Johnson Wagner said. “(Matsuyama) played a little bit slower than me, and I feel I played pretty fast. We kept up with the group in front of us for most of the day.
“I’m a fast player. I don’t like slow play, either. But given his position in the tournament, and given the shot he was facing on 17 _ laying it up out of the fescue over gorse and pot bunkers _ I don’t think he took too long.
“I pleaded in the scoring areas for five minutes. I feel like I let the official know how I felt about it in as gentlemanly (a way) as I could, but it infuriated me that he got a penalty. If they tried to penalize me I would have gone ballistic. So I tried to represent Hedeki as good sa I could and couldn’t get it changed.
“He was playing a great round. Man, the kid was playing great today. I think it’s terrible that he got penalized. Hopefully (on Sunday) he’ll go out and rip it up and put himself in contention again.’’
Matsuyama was not the only player who was dogged by tournament officials for slow play. Sergio Garcia and Padraig Harrington as well as Graeme McDowell and Greg Bourdy were put on the clock as well, though they were not penalized.
“You don’t want to feel like you’re running around the course,’’ an irritated McDowell said after his round. “It unsettles you. You don’t like to be on the clock under s referee’s scrutiny. It’s hard enough out there trying to navigate your way around this golf course. It takes only one bad shot to get out of position.
“I thought they were getting a little hard-core with the watch out there. I get it. We’re up against TV and we’re trying to get this thing done and they’re trying to keep play moving. But have a little common sense, boys.’’
Garcia said, “It’s difficult when you’re on the clock. It’s difficult with anybody that’s struggling, because it’s going to take a little bit more time. It feels like you have to make up for the time. I felt like I was rushing quite a lot. I even played out of position when it probably wasn’t my turn two or three times to catch up.’’
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Paul Lawrie has had quite an interesting two days. He thought he’d missed the cut on Friday and drove back home to Aberdeen only to find out his ended up making the cut. So Lawrie, the 1999 Open champion at Carnoustie, got back into his car, drove the 2 ½ hours back to Muirfield and shot a 1-under-par 70 on Saturday.
“I didn’t think that 7-over par had and chance of making the cut _ never mind 8-over (which was the cut line) so we packed up went home, got the walk the dog and have a bite to eat,’’ Lawrie said. “We were watching (the tournament) on the telly and we had the iPad on the sofa and the texts started coming through telling me I made it.
“So we packed a little bag and got back (to Muirfield) about 20 past 11. I don’t think I’ve ever had to do that before. Thankfully we live just up the road.’’
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After two days of players’ bellyaching about the difficulty of the course set-up, the R&A seemingly softened the place yesterday, watering some fairways and greens to make it more scoreable.
“It was going to get unplayable if they didn’t do anything about it,’’ Richard Sterne said. “I’m glad they did, otherwise I think it would have turned into a real disaster, to be honest.’’
Sterne said the 15th green, which was “a bit of a joke’’ on Friday, was “fine’’ yesterday.
Still, many players are coming away from Muirfield speaking about it as if it’s the toughest test they’ve ever faced.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,’’ Keegan Bradley said. “This is the hardest. The U.S. Open is hard because the rough is so high. Here, it’s out in front of you and it’s still very difficult.’’
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Ernie Els, the defending champion and the last player to win at Muirfield, refused to count himself out entering today’s final round despite being 5-over par. Els came back from six strokes to overtake Adam Scott last year at Lytham.
“If I’m within six or seven, you never know,’’ Els, who is seven back, said. “It happened last year. I’m not saying it’s going to happen every year, but anything can happen in the Open.’’
Els said this has been a difficult week for him because he believes he’s gotten no breaks.
“It’s tough when you’ve won and you’ve had a lot of things going your way and then the next year you don’t get the bounces,’’ he said.
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India’s Shiv Kapur, who started the Open with birdies on sox of his first seven holes Thursday, shot 77 on Friday and 83 yesterday, meaning he’s 21-over par on his last 47 holes. “This is sport,’’ he said. “You have your good days and bad days. The bad days are tough to take.’’