15th April, 2013
Adam Scott could scarcely believe it after he came through a sudden-death play-off to win his first major.
After coming so close at the Open last July, Scott finally broke his major duck in superb style, as he birdied the 18th to seemingly scoop the Green Jacket only to watch Angel Cabrera do exactly the same moments later.
Scott held his nerve though to recover and win at the second extra hole to become the first Australian winner at Augusta.
“I don’t know how that happens,” Scott said. “It seems a long way away from last July when I was trying to win another major. It fell my way today, there was some luck there. It was incredible.”
With Jason Day also in second and Marc Leishman tied for third, it was a great result for Australian golf and Scott was delighted to be flying the flag for his country, but said he owed much of his success to Greg Norman.
“Australia’s a proud sporting nation and this was one notch on the belt that we’d never got,” he added. “It’s amazing that it’s come down to me today, Marc and Jason Day, it could have been any of us.”
Meanwhile, world’s number one, Tiger Woods was left to reflect on his bad luck after finishing tied for fourth at the Masters.
Woods shot a final round 70 to finish at five-under, four strokes behind the eventual winner, Australia’sAdam Scott, but things might have been different had it not been for a wretched break in his second round.
Woods never really recovered from his misfortune but refused to blame that one hole for the result.
“We could do that what if-in every tournament we lose,” Woods said.
“We lose more tournaments than we win out here on tour, so that’s just part of the process and I’ll go back to it.”
For Woods, there is little consolation in finishing fourth. He measures his success by the number of majors he wins. His lifelong ambition to is break Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18 but he has been stranded on 14 since 2008.
Despite coming up short again, Woods said there were still plenty of positives he could take away.
He has already won three PGA Tour titles this year and is starting to look like his old self.
The bookmakers installed him as the favourite to win the Masters and crowds at Augusta National still adore him, cramming the fairways and greens to see him in action and erupting in wild excitement whenever he conjured up some of his old magic.
“I certainly had a chance. If I would have posted a number today, I was right there,” he said. “I was four back starting out the day and I thought I really played well this week. I made my share of putts as well.