Pádraig Harrington's fanciful Ryder Cup dream can spark at Hoylake

In the months after Henrik Stenson was named as Ryder Cup European captain in March 2022, Pádraig Harrington teed up in three separate Majors and suffered a triple cut.

It was only the third time in his long, stellar career that he has suffered three Major cuts in one season – see also 2005 and 2010 – and it pointed to a golfer who looked perhaps more suited to the senior Champions Tour, having made a blistering start in that new environment after hitting the big 5-0.

Golf is an incredibly fluid sport though and a lot can change rapidly.

Stenson is no longer European captain for autumn's event in Rome, replaced by Luke Donald in punishment for joining the breakaway LIV Tour.

Harrington is no longer viewed as a golfer who is showing up because eligibility rules allow him to do so, but instead as a genuine competitor who has finished inside the cut-line in seven of his eight PGA Tour/DP Tour events in 2023.

That form was strengthened by another good showing at the Scottish Open last weekend, and it could have been even better but for three closing bogeys denying him a top-20 spot.

So what does it all mean?

Well, the Dubliner tees off in the Open at Royal Liverpool on Thursday and it’s not stretching it too far to claim that it may end up being one of the most important Majors he ever plays in - outside his three wins - should things go to plan.

Winning is almost certainly beyond him [an assertion he strongly denies in an interview with the Guardian this week] with his two previous visits to Hoylake resulting in missed cuts, but a strong finish here could see calls for his Ryder Cup inclusion grow from a careless whisper into cautious chorus.

It seemed fanciful – it still seems fanciful – but there’s no denying that it’s now a real