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THE 148TH OPEN

July 20, 2019

Danny Willett

Portrush, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom

Q. How was that?
DANNY WILLETT: Yes, it was fun. Yeah, it was a good day's work. We played pretty good most of the week. Like I said, we had a few bad shots on Thursday that cost us some silly drop shots. But apart from that we've played some really good golf.

Today was pretty stellar in the conditions. We had it relatively windy for most of the day. The ball under good control. Had a lot of chances. It's never not fun to shoot 65 on a Saturday Open. We'll see.

Q. Seem to be back, you're in contention in a major?
DANNY WILLETT: Everything is going well. I'm moving well. The work I'm doing with Kev and Fols, everything, we're in a really good place. I've said it for the best part of 12 months now. The results aren't always as you want them to be, but the work I'm putting in is good.

Things are inevitable as to when you're going to win again. It might be this week, next week, six months down, we don't know. But there's enough good in there to do it again, which is a nice feeling. It gives you that little bit of sunlight at the end of it.

Yeah, we just have to wait and see. The weather is kind of turning around now for the next two hours. It's going to lay pretty fast, and the guys could go after it a bit, so we'll have it see.

Q. What were the three things today in your round that you liked in your game today?
DANNY WILLETT: Just the ball flight control. They've been a little sneaky with a couple of pins out there with the crosswinds we had going. And just making it pretty stress-free. To go bogey-free on any round is pretty nice. But they had a couple of sneaky flags, and we played it when the wind was whipping around. A couple of sneaky flags, and played aggressive when we had a chance.

And it's just been a really -- a very professional round of golf.

Q. (Inaudible.)
DANNY WILLETT: You know what, it's one of those, Dubai probably was more so. U.S. Open ordinarily aren't quite my cup of tea with how the way golf courses are set up. But that shows how the golf game is different these days.

Me and Sam were talking about it, to be able to go from America, you come back here, and you're dotting around, and the best players in the world seem to play well week in and week out.

That's when you know your game is taking a real nice trend when you're able to compete in different conditions, different grasses, different weather. That's when you know you can take it with you and things are getting better.

It's nice to come back to links golf. We only get to play it once, twice a year now. It's nice to be able to come back. I've had a pretty good performance so far.

Q. You seemed relaxed.
DANNY WILLETT: No, you know, I'm 31. I've done what most people wish to do in a career already. If you can't be relaxed playing early on a Saturday morning. I'm probably more nervous playing with the lads because I need to be in my own.

So, you know, it's one of those where the juices are flowing and you're trying to hit as good of golf shots as you can. But to be tense, I've done a lot of stuff over the last few years with breathing and all this stuff. The more tense you get, the worse you're breathing gets. The worse your breathing gets, the worse you're going to move. It just has an effect. And stress is a big part of that.

When I was at my worse, that was one of the main factors. And now you can keep yourself relaxed and kind of go about things businesslike, but you might as well have fun doing it and go from there.

Q. People want than from you (inaudible.)
DANNY WILLETT: I think that's their own problem. I don't think DJ does it, I don't think Brooks does it. I think right now they're probably the two best players in the world.

I've watched DJ a lot. And you see how he goes about things. And some people might say his is an act because he looks too relaxed at times. It isn't. It's one of those things. We all do crazy amounts of work away from the golf course where no one sees it, which may be slightly more serious, slightly more nitty-gritty.

Then you get here, these weeks aren't full grind. They're not for being massively worked up about certain things. These weeks on the range, it's a warmup, see how you are. We've already been in the gym, we've already done all those things. It's to try and find the middle of the club face, see what kind of ball flight it's looking like today, see how far things are playing, and kind of go.

If you start getting worked up that much before your round, the golf course, at times a little bit more and makes it worse.

Q. For you to win tomorrow, do you think the wind has to really whip up?
DANNY WILLETT: The wind has to whip up the next few hours. This is how it should be. If you play well in the last group you should get the best weather. The guys early has it flat, calm, and then the wind comes in when the time changes and it makes it brutal out there.

This is how it should be. The leaders get the best weather.

Q. Is there any time in the last few years when you didn't think you'd be back?
DANNY WILLETT: You've obviously not been here very much, have you? There's been many. Yeah, there was. There was a lot. I'm not going back there now, it was a long, long time ago. There were some doubt moments.

Q. You're three off the lead.
DANNY WILLETT: It's not irretrievable. The weather tomorrow looks pretty poor from what I've seen. Not irretrievable, but it's a long way back, isn't it?

Within two or three, four is a nice little shout. Five, six, seven, you start getting that way, and you need other people to do silly things and you need to play well. Whereas if it's 2, 3, 4 shots, you can kind of play well and make up some ground. You don't want to necessarily have the guys have to help you out in doing so.

Q. There's a strong English presence at the top of the leaderboard at the moment. And Lee Westwood, talk about relaxed, he's taking it all with a big smile on his face.
DANNY WILLETT: I played with Lee Tuesday, Wednesday. He's playing some lovely golf. He's in a real good place for the first time in a long time within everything. And I think it shows.

He's always been a fantastic ball-striker, knows this golf course pretty good, as well. We played the Irish Open here a few years ago, and the guys have been here on and off.

Yeah, me and Sam joking out there saying that if Lee went to do something special over the next couple of days, it would be pretty amazing to be able to stand there on the last and see him come in.

Q. On 18, what did you hit and how long was that?
DANNY WILLETT: We 203, 6-iron to about eight feet.

Q. Weather tomorrow is supposed to be just awful. I know you'll deal with it. Talk about how you'll deal with it.
DANNY WILLETT: No idea (laughter). It could be windy and rainy, it could be just windy, it could be just rainy. We don't know until we get up in the afternoon. Weather looks pretty poor from about 9:00 onward tomorrow. Then this place will grow some teeth again.

You've seen it fluctuate through different winds. Winds being stronger, guys find certain holes really difficult, a little bit of rain comes in. If it is forecast what it is tomorrow, 10-, 15-mile-an-hour winds and raining, this place will be a completely different kettle of fish. Just have to go to bed and wake up and see.

Q. Will you talk to Foley tonight and what advice does he given when it comes to you being in contention on Sunday?
DANNY WILLETT: Yeah, I'll speak to him now, we'll have a cup of tea and go over everything.

Yeah, Fol has been monumental in what we've done really in the last two years. So we basically just say that you've got to just keep playing regardless of if there's 18 holes left, 36 holes left, 2 holes left, 1 hole left, you just keep playing. When it's all said and done, you sign your scorecard and see who's won.

If you don't do it this week, you pitch up next week you start on the first hole of 72 and you keep playing again until the week is finished. That's all we can do.

If you look at weeks as individual blocks, I think it's a pretty shortsighted, narrow-minded thing. He's looking at it as a pretty grand scale. And you just keep playing.

I'm going to keep playing for the next 10, 15 years. And when I finally sign my scorecard and retire, I'll have done all right.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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