Rory McIlroy started the Abu Dhabi Championship with what looked like a 4-under 68 on Thursday. But a two-shot penalty for an incident on the par-4 12th changed his score to 70, leaving him eight strokes behind the leader.
The trouble began after McIlroy found the fairway and had 113 yards left to the flag. He sent a wedge shot over the green and into the rough. His next chip came up short of the putting surface, and the ball rolled back into the divot he had just made.
As McIlroy prepared to play his fourth shot, he placed his wedge behind the ball. Video reviewed by rules officials showed a tuft of grass behind it had been pressed down. Officials assessed a two-stroke penalty, turning what had been a double bogey into a quadruple bogey.
Afterward, McIlroy said he had not meant to improve his lie. He described the ball as sitting at the bottom of a sandy divot and said he was trying to get his 54-degree wedge onto the back of it. The grass moved during that process, he explained, and the video did not look good. He accepted the penalty and said he was ready to move on.
It was not McIlroy’s first rules-related controversy this year. At the Open Championship, he criticized Bryson DeChambeau after the American received a two-shot penalty for stomping near his ball, which officials ruled had improved the area for his backswing.
McIlroy said at the time that he was not inclined to defend DeChambeau, adding that he felt some of the golfer’s behavior was performative and attention-seeking. He also objected to the delay while players and volunteers waited for the situation to be resolved.
DeChambeau finished tied for 14th at the Open, while McIlroy tied for 40th.
