Sunday can open the doors for Oosthuizen, believes Cowen

Louis Oosthuizen was a name on few people's lips at the start of the 150th anniversary Open but after four days of the most methodical and unflustered golf he is the new Open champion.

And for the man who has coached him since he arrived in the United Kingdom in 2002, Oosthuizen's major breakthrough has always seemed in the offing, despite a lack of winning experience suggesting otherwise.

The South African's victory at the Open de Andalucia earlier this year was his first win on the European Tour after seven years of trying. Four months on and he is a major champion, emphatically so after his destruction of the field at

St Andrews, and for his long-time coach, Oosthuizen's taste of success is long overdue.

"Louis has always been a tremendous golfer," said renowned Rotherham coach Cowen.

"Even the caddies who go out with him always come back and say what a talent he is and how much of a cool customer he is.

"That's exactly what you get from him, what I've always got from him.

"He holes putts, he's a great course manager and just a superb pro to be around.

"People will say he got the luck of the draw and maybe he did on Thursday and Friday.

"But he posted the scores and then built on it and no one could catch him. That's links golf for you. And when the luck is with you, you've got to make hay because next year or the year afterwards, you may not get that luck."

Oosthuizen was taken under the wing of Cowen in 2002 along with his compatriots Charl Schwartzel and Richard Sterne, two players who had enjoyed more success on the European Tour than Oosthuizen until the weekend.

"He went into St Andrews quietly confident and now he's got the taste of it I'm sure he'll win more majors," said Cowen who believes his protege will resist the temptation afforded him by his new-found status to base himself solely on the more lucrative US Tour.

"He might have one year dedicated to the PGA Tour, which would be good for him, but I would see him becoming a worldwide golfer like Retief Goosen and Ernie Els."

Oosthuizen's triumph made it two successive major wins for Cowen, whose 21-strong stable also includes US Open champion Graeme McDowell.

His reputation, he concedes, is of being a gruff Yorkshireman who offers praise rarely, but in his 13 years as a Tour coach he has found that merely teaching a player how to swing a club is only half the job.

"Teaching them technique is not that difficult, it's the rest of it that surrounds it," said Cowen, who celebrated a one, two, three at St Andrews in Oosthuizen, Lee Westwood and Henrik Stenson.

"A bad attitude will always kill a great golf swing.

"Some kids need a slap on the back, some a clip around the head.

"As a coach, you have got to know what is the best technique for each individual."

The humility Oosthuizen shows is fitting for a champion. And he is backing Paul Casey to bounce back from his disappointing finish, a back nine 40, including a triple bogey seven at the 12th, which handed second place to Worksop's Westwood.

"Paul is a fantastic golfer and a great person," said Oosthuizen.

"He's definitely going to win a major, that's for sure."

The Yorkshire duo of Simon Dyson and Richard Finch both fall under Cowen's tutelage.

Both players along with Westwood, McDowell, Oosthuizen, another Open challenger Alejandro Canizares and a recent winner on Tour, Thomas Bjorn, have put Cowen's expertise to good use in recent years. And Dyson's performance at St Andrews in particular left the wily old coach convinced that if the Malton professional is on the receiving end of similar good fortune to that of his South African stablemate over the weekend, he is just as capable of taking advantage.

Cowen said: "Simon is in with a chance of a Ryder Cup spot still and you never know in golf, he could easily have a week like Louis had.

"He has been playing well and not getting the results, just like Louis was having.

"As we saw at the weekend, all of a sudden it can just happen for you."

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