Rory McIlroy says 'work to do' to feel ready for The Open

Rory McIlroy says he knows he's got work to do if he wants to feel ready for Thursday's opening round of The Open despite capping off a top ten at the Genesis Scottish Open with a closing 64.

The Northern Irishman came into the week with confidence and had led after each of the opening two rounds but struggled on the fog affected Saturday at The Renaissance Club, admitting that he struggled in the left-to-right wind.

"[I] felt like I was pretty much in control of everything after the first two days, and then the long day yesterday, waiting, didn't get off to the best of starts, and then didn't finish the third round off today particularly well," he said.

"Sort of pieced it together. Sort of realised what I was doing. Tried to figure it out a bit on the range before I went out to my final round. At least I know what I'm doing. It's a matter of trying to sort of rectify it. Obviously there was some good in there today but there was some bad, as well.

"So I'm going to need to work a little bit over the next couple of days to be ready for Thursday."

Having spoken about playing well over the first few days, McIlroy dropped three shots on his opening seven holes on Saturday evening before play was overnight suspended after his eighth hole due to fog.

He returned on Sunday morning at 7am but dropped another shot quickly at the ninth, parring the next eight holes until ending his third round with a birdie at the 18th.

A different Rory McIlroy appeared a couple of hours later, immediately making a birdie at the first before adding more gains at the third, fourth, sixth and seventh holes to move into contention for the tournament.

The 2023 champion dropped a shot at the ninth, but made birdies at the 12th and 13th holes, then rebounded from a bogey at the 16th with a final birdie at the par-three 17th to finish his week in a tie for seventh.

Taking some confidence from his final round (despite proclaiming he was 'so bad at golf' after missing the 16th fairway) McIlroy said that he is aware of what the problem is that he needs to work on heading into the final Major of the year.

"I definitely hit it a little better today than I did in round three," he explained.

"I noticed a few things in my game and my iron shots, especially this morning coming out for the sort of back end on the third round, and I went and tried to work it on the range between rounds.

"At least I know what the problem is and it's just about fixing it. It's been pretty windy this week, and then when the wind on the range is off the left, I just get into that bad habit of hitting it further left than the path at impact, and I start hitting left with my iron shots, and I still hit a few out there today but I managed a little bit better and I managed the clubface better and I holed a lot of putts. I putted really well today. That was the difference between 73 and 64.

"It's nice to sign this week off with a good score but I know I need to do a bit of work between now and next Thursday to feel really comfortable with my game. But I don't feel like it's too far away. "