RORY MCILROY HAS his sights set on becoming world number one for the ninth time as he bids to defend his CJ Cup title.
McIlroy can return to the top of the rankings for the first time since July 2020 by winning his 23rd PGA Tour event at Congaree Golf Club in South Carolina, the tournament having moved from Las Vegas.
Current number one Scottie Scheffler would also have to finish worse than a two-way tie for second, although McIlroy can also overhaul the Masters champion with outright second place if Scheffler is outside the top 35.
“I got to number one in the world after I won the Honda Classic in 2012,” McIlroy told a pre-tournament press conference.
“It had been a goal of mine for maybe six months up until that point but I remember waking up the next morning and being like, ‘Is this it?’ You work towards a goal for so long and then you wake up the next day and you don’t feel any different after having achieved it.
“So I think then it’s a matter of having to reframe your goals and reframe what success looks like.
“I think that’s one of the great things about this game, no matter how much you’ve achieved or how much success you’ve had, you always want to do something else, there’s always something else to do.
“I guess the cool thing about it is you get to number one and it feels great in the moment, and the bad thing is you maybe have to work harder to stay there.
“I think if I get back to number one this week it’s my ninth time. It sort of illustrates you can have your runs and you can stay there, but I think the cool part is the journey and the journey getting back there.
“It’s sort of like a heavyweight boxer losing a world title and it’s a journey to get that title back. I feel like that’s the cool part of it and that’s the journey that I’ve sort of been through over the past 12 months.”
McIlroy was ranked 14th in the world before his victory in Las Vegas last year, but has since recorded two further wins and 12 other top-10 finishes to get within striking distance of Scheffler.
“I maybe don’t keep as much of a close eye on it as I used to, but still it’s a point of pride for all of us out there to be highly ranked and to get to number one in the world at whatever you do is an unbelievable accolade and something that you should be proud of,” the four-time major winner added.
“Obviously I have a chance to do it this week, but I’m proud of the fact that I’ve at least given myself a chance again because (when) we were coming back from the lockdown in July 2020 I feel like my game and my life has changed considerably since then, so it’s nice to have the opportunity again.”
The FA needs to address the constant abuse McClean gets at grounds up and down England, not an “offensive word” he puts in a social media post addressing that abuse.
@James Clancy: How many thousands of Irish players have played in England over the years. Did they get constant abuse? If he is going to start interacting with fans on Twitter and Instagram, calling them names and saying they are ‘uneducated’, then he is going to get abused at grounds up and down England. He has no one else to blame but himself.
@CrabaRev: The abuse in stadiums is for the POPPY not the POSTS
@CrabaRev:
I think he’s brave enough to take a stand. Obviously most will not whether it’s Martin O neil Keane whoever as they just don’t want the hassle or publicity or negative career impact.
@IrishD: The abuse is because of his previous posts. He has history on this. The poppy this is just a catalyst. He stupidly rises to the bait. Anybody with half a brain would rise above it.
Matic will get very little abuse about not wearing the poppy. Why? Because he has made a dignified and articulate post about his reasons, and that’s the last you will hear from him on this subject. and if some tosser shouts abuse at him over it, he will ignore him.
@CrabaRev: “no one else to blame but himself.” – words of an uneducated caveman.
@CrabaRev: did you read the open letter he wrote to the Wigan chairman previously. He outlined his reasons for not wearing the poppy. Fair play to him. Matic will not get the same level of abuse because he is not Irish.
@CrabaRev: maybe cause only in the last few years has the poppy become an issue cause for years it was never put on football jerseys and now all of a sudden it has to be,if he doesn’t want to wear it what’s the problem and he’s right the abuse he’s getting just cause of this is ridiculous
: @ Crab – He has tried to explain his position many times to no avail. Hero in my eyes under severe pressure.
@Simon Peters: What does he need to explain. Just don’t wear the poppy and get on with playing football
@Robc: Ah! the old victim Irish thing. Matic will not get the same level of abuse, because he is not an !diot. There are thousands of Irish players who have played in England over the years. They didn’t get abuse.
@Damian Baker: very deep.
@Simon Peters:
Well said
@CrabaRev: they’ve gotten abuse long before social media came about!
@CrabaRev: They didn’t have poppy fascism to deal with though did they. They just stood in silence for a minute one weekend and that was it.
@CrabaRev: Did your teachers have to smash you over the head with a ruler before you got the point when you were young
@Simon Peters: hero me arse.
@CrabaRev: Poppy Fascism is relatively new.
@CrabaRev: no victim Irish thing here as you put it. He is getting abuse because he does not want to wear the poppy. Anyway, did you read the open letter he penned?
@CrabaRev: James McClean also made a dignified and articulate statement about his reasons while he was at Wigan Athletic. It would’ve been the last that you would have heard from him on this subject, except some elements of the media in the UK make sure, each and every tiresome year, that his not wearing a poppy becomes an ‘issue’. That leads to the kind of over the top, unnecessary, sectarian abuse which he was subjected to after the Middlesbrough game.
@Robc:
And if he left it at that there wouldn’t be a story here. Have you ever been to an English football match? Some of the supporters are the lowest of the low. Do you think they all read his open letter and went awww?
Don’t wear the poppy and go out and play football. He had said his piece, there was no need to say more. His problem is, he’s not very bright, and bringing Bobby Sands and being a Fenian into was beyond stupid. I think as an individual he may not be all that different than some of the fans he is giving out about.
@Alan Morrissey: it’s only an issue in the Irish media. The british papers generally ignore it
@dublincomments: They definitely do not. It is prominent in the UK media as they know it sparks debate & controversey which any media outlet thrives on.
@CrabaRev: couldn’t agree more…well phrased…
@Robc: complete and utter paranoid bo**ix..
@James Clancy: they aren’t addressing it because they agree with it
From the hills of Kerry to the streets of free Derry we are behing you James.
There is a slightly condescending attitude when it comes to this issue amongst the Off the Ball boys and other media heads in the Republic, kind of like it’s not really proper abuse that you might find aimed at black people, gay people etc. The scars of the Troubles run very deep for many people and should not be trivialised, particularly by Irish in the south. Our general disregard for our brothers and sisters in the six counties in the last century has been fairly shameful.
@dRod2128: Good point well made, sir
/or madam (oops… this may come back to bite me)
@dRod2128: The main lads on Off the Ball are clueless.
@Joe Phillips: Could be gender neutral
Mcclean has a point. The hypocrisy is shocking. Someone says the n word throws a banana on the pitch or makes anti Muslim comment all hell breaks loose, club fines endless interviews with black Muslim players etc. And rightly so because that too is completely wrong. But the sectarian abuse mcclean Lennon is equally bad yet their protestations do seem to go largely unheard.
@Paul Donaghy: Very valid point. This situation is no different to those you mentioned. Yet nothing will be done.
The ignorance towards Ireland in England is shocking. Among young and old English even the most trivial things they seem to be dumbfounded. How many times do they reject a bank of Ireland sterling note or even bank of Scotland for that matter. Many of them can’t get their head around that it’s all the same sterling. Then understanding Northern Ireland is part of Uk and Republic of Ireland is not makes you feel like your trying to teach them Chinese. They absolutely just don’t want to know. Struggle to pay their council tax yet celebrate the royals living a life of opulence living of it. It’s mad.
@Paul Donaghy: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.joe.ie/amp/news/yet-andrew-maxwell-schooled-british-people-anglo-irish-relations-brexit-646756
James McClean is a proud Irishman and I am behind him 100%
As an Irish traveller who’s faced lot of hate in my life, albeit mostly from fellow Irish Catholics, I sympathize with James McClean.
@Magnum: Always someone to make themselves a victim from someone else’s trauma
@Magnum: You should sympathise with him because he is an Irishman, not because you claim you were abused by others
@Magnum: People would have absolutely no issue with travellers if they added something to Irish society, managed to abide the law once in a while and didn’t wreak havoc on rural communities who live in fear of them. Maybe try that first.
You should sympathise with Magnum because he is your fellow Irishman. This is getting out of hand, the same people who would shout ‘not all men’ can’t understand the concept of ‘not all travellers’. Magnum should have used empathise because he knows what it is to feel hate from prejudiced people. You say it’s not racist, that might be true, but it is definitely discriminatory, using the same logic as what is happening to James, if this was happening to a Black person or a Muslim there would be outrage but because it’s a Traveller it’s ok? The hypocrisy is sickening. I have lived next to travellers and I work with a traveller and I understand that there are travellers who give the community a bad name just like there are both bad and good people in any disadvantaged section of society.
@Pixie McMullen: that’s my point. I do sympathize with James as a fellow Irish man AND I have experienced hate like him, so I know how it feels . But not hate from people of a different country or fait than me, but my own people. My hate is not worse or better than He’s.
hate is hate.
God bless!
@Mike: that’s generalization, not all travellers are what you say, yes we have criminals in our community, low numbers in education which In turn equals low chances of gaining employment.
But there’s another side of the coin, travelers in schools are call discriminating names, handed crayons and left in the bk of the class to Roth.we have a very high suicide rate. The majority of travelers are honest people, I would like to think I am one, I’m a university student with no criminal record , but there’ll alleyways be bad eggs that will ruin it for the rest of us.
As for added things to society..how many Olympic medals have travellers won for Ireland?
We’re not perfect, but you can ’t pain us all with the one brush.
@Magnum: Fair play to you and a measured response. Of course all travellers aren’t bad. A lot are though and the likes of Pavee Point never acknowledge this which makes it impossible to take them seriously. The Gardai turn a blind eye to petty crimes by travellers because they’re afraid of them. They can do what they want around large parts of rural Ireland.
@Mike: thank you. I don’t agree with all Pavee Point say. Like a said, I have seen Travelers do disgusting things, like collecting money in charity boxes for Diseases like cancer,
when I’m almost certain they’re only doing it as a scam. But I have also seen travellers feeding and clothing homeless people on the streets of Dublin.
Interesting how the FA didn`t act on the abuse dished out to McClean last year, even when the offence was caught on camera, here is what James himself said about it,
The FA are playing double standards with him, hypocrisy of the highest order….
This is what he wrote on Instagram.
“The FA are investigating me after Saturday’s game, for what exactly?”
“Yet week in week out for the past seven years I get constant sectarian abuse, death threats, objects being thrown, chanting which is heard loud and clear every week which my family, wife and kids have to listen to.
“They turn a blind eye and not a single word or condemnation of any sort.
“Huddersfield away last year while playing for West Brom where there was an incident with their fans which was on the game highlights, where the cameras clearly caught it, yet the FA when [a] complaint was made to them said there ‘was not enough evidence’.
“If it was a person’s skin colour or if it was anti-Muslim, someone’s gender, there would be an uproar and it would be taken in a completely different way and dealt with in a different manner.”
I’d love to see Leo make a comment on this.
@Ned Flanders: Yes the Taoiseach should definitely be prioritising this over Brexit, homelessness, hospital beds and all his other daily work.
@Patrick Kennedy: a comment. Not a debate in the Dail.
@Patrick Kennedy: given he’s been so successful with health, homelessness and brexit, he could easily spend a few minutes working through his favourite medium…twitter.
@Seán C: Talking through his favourite medium….His Hole,
There, i fixed that for you.
Just listening to Dan McDonnell on Off the Ball – who I think is a very good contributor to the show – saying that people in the media are usually afraid to be heard saying that something is anti-Irish… this is half the problem. Our media should have no problem standing behind McClean on this one, showing that the language used against him is abusive, offensive and racist. When it comes to most matters Irish – especially political, cultural and historical – the ignorance of the English, especially their politicians, is staggering. Uneducated cavemen, said McClean. Cavemen goes too far.
Lots of photos showing people wearing the poppy, Yet they sport Swastika and other Nazi or right wing tattoos. Uneducated is to good a word for them. History lessons would change their minds concerning the wearing of the poppy. Fair play to James McClean for making his stand.
What was the offensive word?
@Brian Dunne: something about seeing you on the day after Monday.
@Brian Dunne: I believe the word was C!$& rhymes with punt. ( we should never have joined the euro btw)
In fairness quoting a convicted terrorist doesn’t do him any favours. No point lambasting the British Army for killing people on the streets of Northern Ireland while at the same time celebrating those who did the same.
While I agree 100% with his stance on not wearing a Poppy.
@Philip Morgan: “a convicted terrorist” do you know what the hunger strike was about?
@Philip Morgan
I guess James Connolly Tom Barry Padraig Pearse joe mc Donnell etc were all convicted terrorists too. They were all madmen without ideals who had no interest in rights or justice they were just psycho crazed terrorists who fought for the hell of it.
@Damian Baker: Robert Gerard Sands was a member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army who died on hunger strike while imprisoned at HM Prison Maze after being sentenced for firearms possession.
Yes I know what the hunger strike was about. Convicted Terrorists wanting special treatment….
@Paul Donaghy: There you go again… Typical terrorist sympathisers response. Bring it back decades.
You will find that those you mentioned apart from McDonnell did not fight in a conflict where deliberately targeting innocent civilians was celebrated. Sands, McDonnell and the rest of the Provos deliberately targeted innocent people and nothing can justify that
@Philip Morgan:
I’ve never known any situation where deliberately targeting innocent civilians was celebrated either by Connolly’s men or McDonnell’s men. Their armies targeted members of the British military machine. Obviously in a war innocent civilians will end up
victims too. Martin McGuinness often said there’s no winners in war.
@Paul Donaghy: What British Military Machine was in the chip shop on the Shankhill road ? What part was in Gene McConvilles house ? What part was in the countless bombs in London or Manchester ?
The IRA where cowardly terrorists who inflitrated a peaceful movement to attain civil rights. The bombed and murdered innocent people in a name of a United Ireland and it took them nearly 40 years to achieve what the Civil Rights Movement would have in ten.
They where as bad as the British Army, The UDA, and the UVF. Far to many innocent civilians lost Thier lives from all sides.
@Philip Morgan:
Shank hill bomb was for loyalist paramilitaries in meeting. It went wrong went off early and obviously a tragedy as innocents were killed. Mc conville was an informant which is worst thing you can do to your own people. Bombs in London and Manchester were financial burden targets on the British govn. Do u really think the Ira set out to kill those 2 Asian lads in canary wharf. Regardless the examples you gave all contradict your original statement of celebrating deliberately targeting innocent people. The British army deliberately killed innocent Irish people for centuries whether directly like blood Sunday or in croke park or indirectly through the famine or Dublin Monaghan bombings. If you have a civil rights march and get murdered for it what’s the alternative have another march and keep getting killed.
@Damian Baker: You’re doing your stance no favours with your attitude that the hunger strikers were great lads altogether but the British army was evil incarnate. Way too simplistic. There was bad on both sides. The RA were a disgusting killing machine that most Irish people abhorred. McClean is right not to wear the poppy but he has handled it poorly over the years – that open letter aside. He can’t help himself and now plays the victim every November. So yes, he does bring a lot of this on himself unlike say a black or Muslim player who gets similar abuse.
@Mike: i didnt say they were a great bunch of lads I agree that there was bad on both sides. I don’t agree that mcclean has handled it poorly. He has explained time and time again why he doesn’t wear the poppy. It’s not just in November when he gets abuse, he gets it all year round. I sympathise 100%.
@Philip Morgan: he quoted a MP
@Philip Morgan:
The people of the the north know that you are either just wrong or or telling lies. The campaign was largely fought against the british crown forces, was necessary and was successful. That is why the nationalist people in the north vote almost to person, for Sinn Fein
@Pat Flynn: Successful? The 6 counties are still in the UK you know!
After 30 years of violence exactly what did they achieve?
Fair dues to McClean every year he stands up for his beliefs every year he gets the same abuse from people that don’t understand why he won’t wear the poppy if he chooses to wear one or not that’s his decision and people need to recognise this and respect his decision one I’m assuming that he doesn’t take lightly, ps if he chooses to defend his beliefs on social media then that’s his choice I say well done to him
It’s funny how the Kick it out foundation are being so quiet on this! If he was coloured they would be all over it
Real Irish men play Gaelic soccer for sissy’s
@Kenneth Ree: What’s Gaelic soccer? Sounds like a cool game
If I was an Ireland player playing in England, or even a player of another nationality, I’d also refuse to wear the poppy in a show of solidarity with McClean. The poppy facism has to stop along with the FA/British media brushing the abuse under the carpet because it doesn’t suit their political agenda. I would love to see more players come out and support McClean this weekend by also declining to wear the poppy.
I would have at a guess there are some 50 or 60 Irishmen plying their trade in the English leagues. I wonder how many of them get abuse week i, week out? I would have at a guess very few if any.
@Malcolm Smith:
Mccleans situation like matic is very specific. He’s only Irish man from Creggan estate in Derry where the British army killed those people. If he wore a poppy his family himself would be totally disowned by his own people. He’s in a different situation to other Irish players. Most English ones in fairness accept that but obviously a few buffoons at games do not.
Regardless of his point and whether or not you agree with him, McClean and most other professional footballers should stay off Twitter. It is unprofessional of him to use that word in a post. As other posters have said he could have left it at his original statement and the media and fans would have moved on. His need to engage with coarse elements reflects poorly on him as an individual and on his club.
@Sean: yes, keep the head down? Let the bigots win?
@tubbsyf: that’s not his point. James is constantly on Twitter, Instagram, etc profounding is irishness and his experience with the troubles. Sometimes giving it a rest, does a lot of good.
@Conor M: in saying that, McLean has very valid points of view and I agree with him.
I’m so impressed with James McClane. A man real intelligence and integrity. He has stood up to this tiresome bloody Poppy fascism with courage. The british empire is dead and gone thank God!