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Rory McIlroy praised for rejecting favourable lie at PGA Championship amid frustrating second round

Rory McIlroy marches off the 18th green alongside Justin Thomas and Tiger Woods: Getty
Rory McIlroy marches off the 18th green alongside Justin Thomas and Tiger Woods: Getty

Rory McIlroy earned plaudits for his integrity as he suffered a frustrating second round in the US PGA Championship in San Francisco.

McIlroy recovered from a slow start at Harding Park to birdie four holes in a row from the seventh and get within five shots of the lead, only to run up a triple-bogey on the 12th after three-putting from seven feet.

A birdie on the 16th repaired some of the damage and the four-time major winner eventually signed for a 69 to finish one under par, seven behind halfway leader Li Haotong.

The incident which saw McIlroy widely praised on social media and during the television commentary had occurred on the third hole, when a TV reporter accidentally stepped on his ball in the rough.

McIlroy was entitled to replace the ball under the supervision of a rules official, and did so, but refused to accept what he thought was a favourable initial lie and dropped again.

“I’m not comfortable with that lie...it’s too good,” he could be heard saying. “I don’t think [the ball] was as visible as that.”

“I just wouldn’t have felt comfortable,” McIlroy later said. “The rule is try to replicate the (original) lie. No-one really knew what the lie was, but if everyone is going around looking for it, it obviously wasn’t too good. So I placed it and I was like, that just doesn’t look right to me. So I just placed it down a little bit.

“At the end of the day, golf is a game of integrity and I never try to get away with anything out there. I’d rather be on the wrong end of the rules rather than on the right end because as golfers, that’s just what we believe. I would have felt pretty wrong if I had taken a lie that was maybe a little better than what it was previously.”

Reuters

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