Rory McIlroy’s carefree 66 at the Open shows a player in control of his game

God but Rory McIlroy makes the game look easy when he’s in the mood. If it hadn’t been for the grandstands, and the tens of thousands of fans, you’d never have guessed what was at stake as he strolled around the Old Course in the opening round of the Open.

Up, down and around the slopes and hollows, all the drives down the middle, a chip there, a flop there, each lag putt right up to the hole, each short one into it, the ball only ever one stroke away from where he wanted it to be. He made a carefree 66, with seven birdies, and just the one dropped shot.

He was paired with Collin Morikawa, who made 72, and Xander Schauffele, who made 69, but it felt at times like they were only there to help put the way McIlroy was playing into proper perspective, like those little diagrammatic humans included in the picture to give it a sense of scale. Morikawa is the reigning champion golfer of the year, Schauffele has just won the Travellers and the Scottish Open back-to-back and is in better form than any man on the Tour, but they struggled to keep up. “It was awesome,” Morikawa said. “That’s what I need the next three days.”

On the par-five 5th, McIlroy’s drive smacked into an old boundary stone. It cost him 30 yards or so. The first he knew about it was when someone pointed it out. “I think I still hit it past the other two.” He still picked up a birdie too.

He had made his first of the day on the opening hole, with a 30ft putt that set his morning up like ham and eggs in bed. There was a third at the 6th and a fourth at the 7th. But it was the par he made at the 8th that he picked out as one of his favourite moments of the round. “I hit a good putt for birdie on the 8th hole, but hit it three feet by. I wasn’t really that