Tiger and Rory warm up for St Andrews in style

In his pomp Tiger Woods would always warm up with some world-class links golf in Ireland and this year has been no different.

After two days at Adare Manor in the JP McManus Pro-Am Woods revealed that he would be staying on the Emerald Isle for some more golf but that was as far as he would go.

"No, I don't want to tell you because I don't want everyone coming down and watching us," he said. “I’ve always loved coming to Ireland. I’ve loved coming here since first time, I think it was in ’99 when me, Payne and Marco (Mark O’Meara) were over here and we were fishing down in Waterville here. We played Ballybunion. Payne made a hole-in-one. We’ve had some great times."


Then he popped up at Ballybunion on the west coast on Thursday and he had none other than Rory McIlroy for company – the fourball was made up by McIlroy’s agent Sean O’Flaherty and Woods’ manager Rob McNamara.

One video showed McIlroy explaining how he used to play one of the holes before another showed plenty of swing speed on one of Woods' tee shots.

There's been no information on how Woods played – he shot 77-74 at Adare Manor – but the signs look good ahead of his third major appearance of 2022.

We don't know whether he will sneak in another Irish links before heading to St Andrews.

Earlier in the week there were sightings of Jordan Spieth, Scottie Scheffler, Justin Thomas, Rickie Fowler, Adam Scott and Sam Burns all making the most of Ireland with rounds at Lahinch and Tralee.