The date wasn’t lost on Justin Rose when he took his seat in the Royal Box on Wimbledon’s Centre Court a couple of Tuesdays ago. He knew precisely where he was on the same day a year earlier.
‘I was aware of it — it’s not one I’d forget,’ he tells Mail Sport, and his memory goes to a spot on the coast in Somerset, Burnham & Berrow Golf Club. It’s a lovely place to have a hit, but not so desirable if you’re a former world No 1, because to be there on July 1, 2024 would suggest something had gone wrong.
For Rose, it had. He was down to 67th in the rankings last summer, which is why he had been forced to enter qualifying for the Open for the first time in more than two decades. He was 43 and apparently on one of those slides that come to everyone in the end.
‘That was a pretty humbling moment if I’m honest,’ he says. ‘I suppose it’s one of those where you just have to check your ego at the door because golf can do that to you. And will.
‘It doesn’t get easier as you get older and there’s no fat contract where you sit on the bench and bank an easy cheque — you have to earn your stripes every week. I had no choice that week.’
He can smile about it, because we know what came next and, more pertinently, what then came after that — he got through 36 holes in a day at qualifying and finished second in the big one at Troon. It was remarkable, only to be eclipsed when he repeated the trick at the Masters in April.
Suffice to say, a lot can change in 12 months. When Open qualifying was being staged this month, Rose didn’t need to sweat on his place at Portrush — he instead killed a little time watching another old boy fighting against the clock on the lawn below.
Rose admires Novak Djokovic, 38, in the same way all of sport’s senior citizens do. ‘It’s the thing about showing you’re still there, proving it, believing you can still do it,’ says Rose.
He will be 45 at the end of this month and he, too, is still believing ahead of Portrush, where he resumes his 12-year mission to follow up on that 2013 win at the US Open.
That he has since summited the rankings, won an Olympic gold medal and reached 25 worldwide titles is the story of one of the most underrated careers in British sport. But there is a nagging sense within Rose that the portrait is incomplete.
No doubt, the proximity of those near-misses to Xander Schauffele at Troon and Rory McIlroy at the Masters only exacerbate the feeling, and yet they are also the proof that he remains close.
His relationship with those results is complicated. ‘They’ve hurt,’ Rose admits.
‘Reflecting now, the feeling is a little like, “Damn, I’ve been really close to actually doing exactly what I’m trying to do”, and that’s taking my career to the next level — being a multiple major champion, or just further up the list of best players of my generation.
‘It has come down to a bit of luck, one shot, or just a toss of a coin almost, and it hurts. Of course it does. And the Open, that maybe just hurt a bit more. I was a kid when I broke through there (Rose was a 17-year-old amateur when he finished fourth in 1998) and winning would have been the perfect way of going full circle.
‘You have hard times in golf and I have had them. Three or four years ago I felt lost with my game and then it came back, which of course is very satisfying, but you go close in a major and naturally you wish it had a slightly different ending.
‘I know I can’t beat myself up too much about it because on both Sundays, I brought my best, and it came down to tiny margins and excellent champions. I’m proud of putting myself in those positions and leaving it all out there. I threw everything at them.
‘I’m nearly 45, and getting better is probably unrealistic in a lot of ways, but I think I can still find a one per cent that’s going to matter somewhere. I still believe I can win and as long as I think that, I’ll keep putting the work in.’
To illustrate his age, Rose mentions the groans he now emits when he sits down after a round.
A £200,000 motorhome decked with ice baths and the like has kept his muscles young, but an old back is an old back. He has had to become selective with his targets.
‘I’m not interested in having to play well 30 weeks a year,’ he says. ‘I’m after those moments that are going to make a difference, the ones that matter most at the majors, and I’ve done a really good job at that.
‘The difficulty is you can’t rely on turning it on just because it’s a major. There’s no magic pill — you need to play well going into majors. Even this year, my game has been a bit up and down for my liking, but I know my good is good, and if it’s good at a major, I can do well.’
Rose’s near future is fascinating. On the one hand, that means ending a streak of missed cuts at the past two majors — the PGA Championship and US Open — on the links of Portrush, where the premium on nous can cancel out the benefit of youthful strength.
On the other, it concerns the Ryder Cup. In terms of the latter, it is extremely likely that European captain Luke Donald will call on Rose, the world No 23, for a seventh Cup appearance later this summer. It is also highly probable that Rose will be in the mix as a player for 2027 at Adare Manor, when most had expected him to be captain.
‘A good problem to have,’ he says. ‘It would be an honour to be asked, but who knows what I’ll be doing with the clubs at that point.’
Based on the past year, it would be foolish to bet against him at this point.
