Rory McIlroy predicts Tiger Woods could struggle to adapt to silent golf without fans

Rory McIlroy expects the decibel tables to be turned when he plays with Tiger Woods in the strongest regular PGA Tour ever contested at the Memorial.

While McIlroy has previously confessed to being distracted by the circus that always accompanies Woods, he feels that the 15-time major-winner will be the one who struggles on Thursday because of the sound of behind-closed-doors silence. And he is talking from personal experience after failing to finish in the top 10 of any of the three events he has contested since last month’s restart.

“I’ve realised that it's very hard for me to keep focus out here,” McIlroy said. “When there's that energy and the atmosphere, it's easy to get into that mindset…  but in those first three weeks my mind was wandering and it was easy to lose concentration. So it was good just to  dip my tie in get a feel for what it was going to be like.

‘Someone like Tiger hasn't experienced that yet, and maybe he's going to find it a little weird out there tomorrow with not having any fans, especially with the amount of crowds that he has to deal with all the time.”

Indeed, Muirfield Village would otherwise have been buzzing with anticipation at 1.17pm when McIlroy, Woods and Brooks Koepka tee off at the event promoted by Jack Nicklaus, on the course he designed and controls.

Of course, this week was supposed to witness The Open Championship at Royal St George’s and although this dollarfest at Ohio - a prize fund of $9.3m (£7.4m) and a winning cheque for $1.7m - cannot begin to live up to that billing, as a replacement act it is hardly Huey and The News filling in for The Beatles.

There are 42 of the world’s top 50 in attendance and four of these could usurp McIlroy as No 1 on Sunday. Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas, Dustin Johnson and, believe it or not, Webb Simpson all have the opportunity to claim the summit and with McIlroy seemingly bereft of form after the three-month hiatus, it must be very tempting to peer upwards.

Except McIlroy believes the old Rory is set to appear again, the “old” Rory who in his 11 events immediately before the coronavirus hooter sounded recorded two victories, nine top fives and 10 top 10s. Not only has he acclimatised him to the mute arena, but in the last two weeks he has been reunited with long-time coach Michael Bannon, who came over from Northern Ireland and moved into McIlroy’s guest house.

“It was the first time I'd seen him since the start of February,” McIlroy said. “Obviously I've sent him videos but it's hard for him to see what the ball-flight is and all the stuff that goes along with being a coach. For him to see how I'm hitting it, was a great thing.

“My clubface was getting a little shut, my right arm was getting a little too much on top of the shaft instead of letting my right elbow fold and I was getting a little bit of external rotation in my shoulder. It was very beneficial to spend that time with him.”

There are also some new TaylorMade P7MB irons in his bag, as well as a return to a more obliging driver, making McIlroy sense a “proper restart” after the restart. “I saw a stat yesterday that this field is stronger than the last eight Masters [in terms of world rankings],” McIlroy said. “So we have this, we've a World Golf Championship [in two weeks], and then straight afterwards the first major of the season, the [US] PGA. It's definitely the start of a big run.”