Nine years on, The Open Championship returns to the stunning North West coast and Royal Birkdale this week.
Widely regarded as one of England’s finest courses, the fabled Lancashire links plays host to the 146th staging of golf’s oldest tournament on Thursday when the game’s best battle to follow Sergio Garcia and Brooks Koepka as this year’s major champions.
Of course, Birkdale is no stranger to hosting The Open. In fact, it has staged the event nine times, and during those tournaments, it has produced some truly memorable Open moments.
Ahead of this year’s event, let’s look at 6 Greatest Open Moments at Birkdale.
Arnie’s Triumph in 1961
Arnold Palmer captured successive Claret Jugs in 1961 and 1962 and the hearts of the British public with it. His first came at Royal Birkdale, thanks to a virtuoso performance that mirrored the swagger and charisma of his personality.
By the time Palmer hopped back on his transatlantic flight, his knowing smile and steel mill forearms were the talk of Merseyside.
But his golf wasn’t bad, either. In fact, Arnie’s triumph in 1961 included one of The Open’s greatest ever shots. In the final round, a wayward drive landed him ‘deep in the blackberry bushes.’ Bearing in mind this was a pre-Seve era, most expected him to chip out sideways and preserve his four-shot lead. Instead, Palmer defied logic and smashed a stunning 6-iron to the heart of the green.
It was a brave shot worthy of one of golf’s greatest champions.
Trevino and Mr Lu’s battle in 1971
A decade after Birkdale toasted a popular peoples’ champion in Palmer, Lee Trevino – the ever-affable Texan – emerged in another example of the ‘good guy winning.’
The often wind-whipped Merseyside links welcomed glorious weather for the 100th Open in 1971, which is remembered for two things: Trevino’s win, and Mr Lu, the pork-pie hat-sporting Taiwan golfer who the Merry Mex edged by a stroke.
The duo engaged in a compelling battle but it was Trevino’s year, with birdies in five of his last six holes seeing him home in style. Trevino did it his way, too: a devil-may-care approach to golf that echoed his vibrant social life (he stayed out drinking until 4am every night the week he won with his actor friend Jimmy Dean at the Kingsway).
That’s just the way they did it back then.
The dawn of Seve
Not for the first – or the last – time, the winner at Birkdale was to be overshadowed by a more magnetic force. In 1976, Johnny Miller fired a superb 66 on the final day to clinch the Claret Jug, but it was a 19-year-old Spaniard by the name of Seve Ballesteros that took up the most column inches on Monday’s sports pages.
In sweltering conditions, Seve lashed wild drives and conjured up spectacular recovery shots throughout the week as he made a swashbuckling bid for glory.
It was not to be – nobody could match the forensic brilliance of Miller - but Ballesteros’ blossoming love for links golf would see him triumph at Lytham three years later and become one of the Open’s greatest sons by the end of his career, with further victories in 1984 and 1988.
In bloom: Rose in ‘98
Mark O’Meara became the oldest Open winner in 1998, at the age of 41, but it was the thrilling emergence of a player at the other end of his career that really caught the eye.
A 17-year-old Justin Rose defied expectations at that year’s championship to finish fourth, a 45-yard hole-out at the 72nd hole clinching the silver medal for best amateur in a flash of showmanship that belied his tender years. Nearly 20 years later, Rose returns to Birkdale a major champion, and one of the favourites.
Lyle gets cold fingers
Sandy Lyle has always been held in the highest regard in the game of golf, and for good reason. The Scot won The Open in 1985 before conquering Augusta three years later to slip into the Green Jacket as a Masters winner.
However, he was a man condemned when he withdrew from a rain and wind-battered 2008 Open at Birkdale after just 10 holes, citing nothing more than merely an “out of whack game.”
Outrage ensued. Peter Dawson, the R&A’s chief executive, called Lyle’s decision "very disappointing," while the Scot’s lack of contrition – he merely said hitting shots was making his fingers numb - afterwards is widely believed to have cost him any chance of becoming the Ryder Cup captain – meaning he is the only one of Europe’s ‘Big Five’ of the 1970s and 80s (Ballesteros, Nick Faldo, Ian Woosnam and Bernhard Langer completed the quintet) not to have led Europe.
Harrington’s eagle
The greatest shot ever hit at an Open? Quite possibly. While Lyle’s game in 2008 was in tatters, Harrington’s was working to optimum, Claret Jug-capturing efficiency.
The one-time Irish journeyman arrived at Birkdale with realistic hopes of defending the title he’d won a year earlier at Carnoustie. Along with the rest of the field, Harrington negotiated fearsome conditions and methodically plodded his way around the Southport course, eventually finding himself with a two-shot lead over Ian Poulter with two holes to play.
He then had a decision to make on the par-5 17th: lay up, and leave the door slightly ajar for Poulter, or go straight for the pin and leave it to fate.
He chose the latter, clattering a majestic, towering 5-wood from 272 yards that rolled to four feet and won the tournament there and then. It was a shot of both immense courage and deadly execution, and one which symbolised Harrington’s transformation from a relatively unremarkable tour pro to a genuine titan of the modern game.
