RORY MCILROY WILL play alongside world number two Hideki Matsuyama and Spain’s Jon Rahm for the first two rounds of his title defence at the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open.
The groupings and tee times for Thursday and Friday have been announced by the European Tour, with this year’s tournament taking place on the links at Portstewart.
McIlroy, who is once again hosting the event through his charitable foundation, tees off at 1.20pm on Thursday afternoon in a group which contains three players inside the top 15 in the world.
Matsuyama will make his first appearance at a regular European Tour event and arrives in Ireland as one of the in-form players in the world having won three times on the PGA Tour in the last 18 months.
Rahm, meanwhile, has enjoyed a meteoric rise in 2017 having jumped up to 11th in the world after finishing in a tie for 27th in the Masters.
Paul Dunne (1.10pm) is in the group ahead of McIlroy on the opening day with the Wicklow native playing alongside English duo Lee Westwood and Tyrrell Hatton while Danny Willett, Matt Fitzpatrick and Ian Poulter make up another notable group.
Shane Lowry (8.10am), Graeme McDowell (8.20am) and Pádraig Harrington (8.30am) are among the early starters on Thursday.
2008 champion Lowry has been paired with Thomas Pieters and Rafa Cabrera Bello while McDowell plays with French Open winner Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose.
In total, there are 17 Irish professionals in a quality 156-player field after Waterford’s Gary Hurley was yesterday handed a late invitation.
Full tee times available here.
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He stayed too long, not his fault, the love of the game and all that, but he kept out a lot of good young lads from getting experience, and now they are paying for it, they have a problem in that sector now. He should have been eased out a few years ago.
So you put the best keeper in the country on the bench for others to gain experience???
U don’t seriously believe he was even the best keeper in tipp for the last three or four years.
I think Tipperary hurling would be in a bad state if it wasnt for the likes of Brendan Cummins , he oppitimises everything that is good about the gaa and has been a rock in the Tipperary defence over the past two decades . I always felt that whatever forward was running at our defence and having broke through the backline they would look up and think i ve done the easy part …..now how do i get the ball past Brendan. I wish him every success in his future endeavours and am thankful that I got to see a true legend of the game playing at his best over such a long period .
One of the greats but give Darren Gleeson a chance. He’s a good player and hasn’t let Tipp down. You can’t replace the likes of cummins, you just have to move on. Darragh Egan experiment not a success though.