Royal Troon: As Rory McIlroy went through his five stages of grief in the aftermath of the US Open loss at Pinehurst, a thoughtfully constructed message by Tiger Woods to his Northern Irish friend and business partner became an innocent victim of the process.

Two days after that eventful Sunday, when he missed short putts on the 16th and 18th holes to lose to Bryson DeChambeau by one, McIlroy ditched his regular number. Woods felt he should give McIlroy a few days to recover, so when he did finally send his message, it never got delivered.

McIlroy will now be keen to show – literally and figuratively – that at the 152nd Open Championship this week, most other players in the field don’t have his number as well.

The 2014 Open champion and the world No2 has been without a major win since the 2014 PGA Championship. But that hasn’t stopped him from being the most marked man in the field whenever he tees up, and Royal Troon will be no exception.

The US Open disaster had such devastating impact on McIlroy, he thought he’d need at least a month away from golf.

But the healing, which included long walks on the Chelsea High Line in an effort to get lost in the crowd of Manhattan apart from throwing away his old SIM, came quicker than he expected.

To a question about how much time he needed to reach the acceptance stage of grieving process, McIlroy said: “It (getting a new phone number) wasn’t out of grief, but okay…

“I would say, maybe three or four days after. Went from being very disappointed and dejected to trying to focus on the positives to then wanting to learn from the negatives and then getting to the point where you become enthusiastic and motivated to go again.

“It’s funny how your mindset can go from ‘I don’t want to see a golf course for a month’ to like four days later being ‘can’t wait to get another shot at it’. When that disappointment turns to motivation, that’s when it’s time to go again.”

McIlroy was back competing last week at the Scottish Open and put up a great defence of his title before finishing tied 14th with a 14-under par score.

On the eve of getting back on one of the most challenging links courses on the Open rota, McIlroy said: “Game’s in really good shape and felt like I shook off a little bit of the rust last week and played okay. I probably could have given myself more of a chance to win the tournament.

“I thought it was a solid week. Again, it’s like one eye on preparing for this week, but another eye on trying to get into contention as well.”

Woods swatted any thoughts of early retirement, including the recent suggestion of Scottish great Colin Montgomerie, and said he felt he was heading in the right direction.

“I’ve been training a lot better. We’ve been busting it pretty hard in the gym and the body’s been feeling better to be able to do such things, and it translates on being able to hit the ball better,” said Woods, who missed the cut at the US Open and the PGA Championship earlier this year.

“Can’t quite stay out there during a practice session as long as I’d like, but I’m able to do some things that I haven’t done all year, which is nice.

“As a past champion, I’m exempt until I’m 60. Colin’s not a past champion, so he’s not exempt. So, he doesn’t get the opportunity to make that decision. I do.”

Woods also felt that links golf, with its unique characteristics of firm fairways and greens usually favouring older and more experienced players, boosted his chances of a possible 16th major title.

“The older you get, the less you can carry the golf ball. But over here, you can run the golf ball 100 yards if you get the right wind and the right trajectory,” explained Woods.

“It negates somewhat of the high launch conditions that most of the times you see on the Tour that populate the world nowadays. That’s one of the reasons why you see older champions up there on the board because they’re not forced to have to carry the ball 320 yards anymore.”

McIlroy has been paired with Max Homa and Tyrrell Hatton and get their campaign off on Thursday at 1009 local time (1439 IST). Woods tees off with Xander Schaufelle and Brooks Koepka at 1437 local time (1907 IST). India’s Shubhankar Sharma tees off at 1244 IST.

Read Also: for esha, an asian games template for her first olympics