Nick Westby: Open return to Royal St George’s rekindles Roe’s card nightmare

Every year, the Open Championship throws up tales of glory, opportunity and despair.

For the glory, read Tiger Woods, Sir Nick Faldo, Greg Norman, Padraig Harrington.

For the opportunity, remember a young Rory McIlroy as an amateur at Carnoustie four years ago, Louis Oosthuizen grabbing his chance and the Claret Jug at St Andrews last year, and the dozens of club professionals and local amateurs who each year get their chance to rub shoulders with the greatest players in the world.

Unfortunately, the despair comes in equal measure.

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For every Jack Nicklaus there is a Doug Sanders; every Ben Curtis a Thomas Bjorn; Harrington a Sergio Garcia.

Then there are the exceptional moments of gut-wrenching heartache, when opportunity is ripped out of a player’s hands.

For that, read Mark Roe.

Eight years ago, the Sheffield golfer carded the round of his major championship life; a 67 at the brutal Royal St George’s links, a course where golf balls vanished regularly in the treacherous rough.

Roe’s round was the joint lowest of the whole week and moved him into a share of third place with 18 holes to play.

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Any golfer will tell you the first three days of a major are all about positioning yourself for the final round.

Roe was perhaps not in position A, but he not far behind.

What happened next ended not only his Open challenge but his career in majors.

He and playing partner Jesper Parnevik were thrown out after putting their signatures to the wrong scorecard, having failed to exchange them on the first tee.

It would not happen today as the rule was subsequently changed. But what might have been...

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Few would have fancied Roe to finish the job on the Sunday, with such stellar names as Bjorn, Woods, Vijay Singh and Davis Love III all in the hunt that final day of the 2003 Open on the scorched links of Sandwich.

But when an unheralded and unknown Curtis came through on his major debut and from a ranking of 396th, then who knows what might have been?

While Curtis lifted the trophy, Roe was already back at home in floods of tears.

“I just had to – it was the release of the whole thing,” Roe recalled of the most tumultuous sporting weekend of his life.

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“I watched the finish. The Sunday was an absolute muddle of emotion.

“I’d spoken to the media and gone home, then had a day with (wife) Julia and the kids up until about 3.30pm when I said I wanted to see the end of it.

“I guess it was the irony of the winner being unheralded that made me go upstairs and cry my eyes out.

“I’d just bottled it all up until then. Of course nobody expected Mark Roe to win the Open, but then nobody expected Ben Curtis to.

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“There’s always that hollow feeling. There could have been a total change in my life.

“Play all over the world, jump in a private jet, have that house you dreamt of having.

“There was one being built on the outskirts of Great Bookham and Julia and I kept passing it.

“The week before the Open I kept saying to her ‘Jules, if I win we’ll buy that’. It was really beautiful.

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“And second to a practice round with Seve at Augusta, which is simply the finest thing I have ever done in my golfing life, I can only think that playing with Tiger Woods on the Sunday of an Open with a chance to win is every golfer’s dream.

“I had never played with him – and I never did.”

What might have been, indeed. There was a huge furore over the decision at the time, but however unfair it seemed Roe did not demand reinstatement himself.

Some time later he was told ‘by a strong source’ that the same thing had happened at the Masters and the names were changed without the players involved being told.

Roe said: “The rules were in place at that time and I wouldn’t have wanted to play. I would have had no interest in it, none at all.

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“My father was a gentleman who taught me the importance of etiquette in the game, so there was no other way for me to react,” he said.

And what if the scorecard blunder had only come to light after he had won?

“I would been allowed to keep the Claret Jug, but I would have felt terrible. Any stigma would make it hollow for me – totally ruin it – so I’m glad that did not happen,” he said.

“And I can honestly say now that it wouldn’t have been a good thing for me to win the Open Championship.

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“Don’t get me wrong – I would have loved to have done it and it would have been the greatest thing in my life – but I don’t think it would have made me happier in the long term.

“I am so happy now doing what I am doing, working with Sky TV and coaching. I think I’m more fulfilled.

“It would have brought the pressure to be away more. I would have been thrust into a different world.

“Where I am now I find myself at peace with myself, loving what I am doing and controlling what I’m doing.

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“Maybe it’s fate. There would have been a strong case for me to shoot 75 on the Sunday in any case. But who knows?”

Roe’s Open dream was shattered seven years after a marriage break-up almost led to him taking his own life. He had put a loaded shotgun in his mouth, but pulled back from the brink.

The drama of Sandwich was nothing compared to that, of course, but in sporting terms it is what his 22 seasons on the European Tour is most remembered for.

Now he is a leading pundit and a short-game tutor to the likes of Lee Westwood and Ross Fisher. But he can still recall the words of the official when all seemed well with his scorecard after he had checked it, double-checked it and handed it in.

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“I remember it crystal clear – ‘35, 32 Mr Roe – 67. Congratulations. Great round of golf. You’re free to go’.”

Little did they know that moments later he would be called back – and told he was out.

What more stories of despair, glory and opportunity await us this week at Sandwich?