Bob MacIntyre playing for pride against Sergio Garcia in WGC Match Play

Bob MacIntyre will be playing for pride against Ryder Cup legend Sergio Garcia on Friday after suffering a second successive loss in the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play in Texas.

Having already tasted defeat at the hands of Open champion Collin Morikawa on Wednesday, MacIntyre needed to beat American Jason Kokrak to keep alive his hopes of reaching the knock-out stage at Austin Country Club for the second year in a row.

As had been the case in his opening match, though, the 25-year-old from Oban found himself on the back foot almost from the off and trailed his opponent on this occasion all the way from the second hole.

Despite making birdies at the fourth, sixth, tenth and 13th holes, he eventually succumbed 3&2 to Kokrak, the world No 27 and a three-time winner on the PGA Tour.

Kokrak, who lost 4&3 to Garcia in his opening match, admitted he’d seen improvements in his game. “I hit the ball a lot better today,” he said.

“(Coach) Drew Steckel and I worked on something that we talked about yesterday and a little bit of something this morning on the way here.

“I was getting my left wrist a little cupped on the takeaway and on the backswing, so that was causing me to miss a lot right and be short.

“We tried to make it a little bit flatter at the top of the swing, and it really helped out as I hit a lot of quality golf shots today.”

The double defeat means MacIntyre can no longer progress to the last 16, as he did 12 months ago from a group that included Dustin Johnson, the world No 1 at the time, on his debut in the event.

Garcia, the record points-scorer in the Ryder Cup, heads into the match against MacIntyre tied with Morikawa on one-and-a-half points after the Spaniard secured an unlikely share of the spoils in the