Monty Takes Benson & Hedges
No shocks. No surprises. No alarms. Just another routine victory.
It went as it had been written.
Colin Montgomerie was the favourite to win the Benson and Hedges International Open before a ball was struck, but there's nothing unusual in that.
It was not even much of a surprise when he went on to take the title Sunday with a closing 68 and a 15-under-par total of 273. Neither was anybody really shocked by the fact that he had a three-stroke winning margin; he once won an European Tour event by 11.
If there was anything at all to distinguish this triumph from the 17 that had preceded it in Europe was the fact that Montgomerie came to The Oxfordshire off a three-week break during which he did not touch a club, never mind hit a ball with one.
He's an extraordinary fellow and is Europe's No. 1 golfer. He has a capacity to compartmentalize his life like no other successful player in modern times, with the possible exception of Bruce Lietzke.
It's as though his golf game is a sophisticated piece of equipment that he is able to use for a few weeks, pack away in a box for a few weeks more, then unwrap it from its protective lining, plug it in again, turn it on and immediately have it running at maximum efficiency.
For him, of course, maximum efficiency means winning, for he has not only the soundest, simplest and most ordered game in European golf but also has prodigious natural talent. It's an exotic and potent mixture, and it was seen at its best in this tournament.
"I played for six weeks in the United States and didn't do much," he said. "My best finish was eleventh, in the Masters, and I was in danger of getting tired.
"I don't give myself the chance to get stale; I need breaks to keep myself fresh for the game. The time I took off was vital, but it obviously worked, because here I am playing my first tournament back after three weeks, and I've just shot 68 in the last round to win, which proves I'm fresh again.
"I suppose I am pretty unusual in that respect, and I realize it wouldn't be right for everybody, but it works for me. If people can learn a lesson from me, it is probably that they should get away from the game from time to time."
Montgomerie was, if not exactly pushed, at least made aware throughout most of this final round that he was not the only man playing birdie golf on the wide open spaces of The Oxfordshire.
Angel Cabrera, the big-hitter from Argentina, played well enough to have put pressure on many a lesser opponent than Montgomerie, but the closest he got to the big Scot was one stroke.
Nonetheless, his was a song that was well sung until the last line of the last verse -- he missed a putt for par on the home hole after having to play ut of a greenside bunker. The bogey pushed him back from second place on his own to a share of the spoils with Per-Ulrik Johansson, his playing partner.
That one moment of inefficiency cost the personable South American more than £19,000. On such things are large sacks of cash sometimes won and lost in big-time golf.
Well though Cabrera and Johansson played -- and Miguel Angel Jiménez and Diego Borrego, who charged into fourth spot on 11 under, too -- Montgomerie always gave the impression that he had something in hand.
"I took a look at the scoreboard going from the 13th green to the 14th tee, and I knew Cabrera was there," he said. "He's a big hitter, and I thought he would be able to get up on the 17th, so I knew I couldn't afford any mistakes."
He didn't add, but might have done, that he didn't want to get involved in a playoff, either, because his record in sudden-death is the only fallible part of his game -- he has been in four in Europe, and has lost every one of them.
In the event, such things did not come into the equation. Already on 14 under when Cabrera birdied the 13th and 14th, he had his own fourth birdie of the day on the 17th, chipping to eight feet and holing the putt.
That hole produced a stroke that was certainly the best of the day, probably the best of the week and might possibly prove to be the best of the entire year.
A 3-wood it was, off a downhill lie and with water to negotiate. His ball was 252 yards to the front of the green; a long, raking, perfectly hit 3-wood was needed for the shot, and that was exactly what it got.
"It was a big shot in every sense of the word," said Montgomerie. "I needed to catch it exactly right, and fortunately it came right out of the middle of the bat. As soon as the ball was in mid-air, the tournament was dead."
Montgomerie was delighted with his victory, as he had every cause to be, but what pleased him more than the £133,000 he won was his remarkable consistency. He had only two bogeys in 72 holes -- he will go into the European TPC at Heidelburg, in Germany, this week and the Volvo PGA Championship at Wentworth the week after in good heart.
"I know I said before this started that I wanted to win two out of the next three tournaments, but you don't honestly believe that sort of thing," he said. "You just try to talk yourself into being extra confident. Now I can say that if I play this well in the next two weeks, it might even be possible."
Finally, a little story that is heartwarming enough to make anybody's day. At precisely 11:30 a.m. on the final day of the tournament, six-month-old Tom Robinson was being hristened in a parish church in Evesham, in the county of Worcestershire.
Meanwhile, 60 miles down the road, his father, Jeremy Robinson, was holing a putt on the last green of The Oxfordshire that gave him a course record of 64 and £28,000 for fifth place.
Twice before, Tom's christening had been arranged and then postponed because of dad's sporting commitments. The elder Robinson got into the tournament as first reserve only at midday on Thursday when Germany's Alex Cejka had to withdraw, so this time the Tom Robinson gig had to go on.
Little Tom was all set to be the star of the show when Sunday dawned. A few hours later, he had to share the top-of-the-bill spot with his dad. It will be a long time before any of the Robinson family forget Sunday, May 16, 1999.