What to expect from Scheffler and McIlroy and more Open Championship storylines

The 2025 Open Championship is running on ET at 1:35 pm on Thursday at Royal Portrash, Northern Ireland.

Xander Schaffele Defending champion while Shane lori Was last won when it was played open in 2019.

Scotty chefler And Rory McLeroy Enter the world as number 1 and number 2 and the winners of two of the first three big companies of the year.

Will the big name fight it on top? Can long shots choose? And how to play Royal Portrash in the next four days? We try to answer some of the biggest questions going to the 153rd Open.

Is Scotty Chefler still a favorite this week?

Mark Shlabach: Open is the only major championship in which the Sheffeler is not finished in the top three, but the link golf has not made it at all. He has several top -25 in the event, including a tie for the seventh at the Royal Tron Golf Club in Scotland last year.

The link golf will seem to fully fit the three -time Major Champion game. Their world -class iron games should not be left in many difficult places, and on a rare occasion when he remembers green, their extraordinary short game should be able to take them out. They say, which was once considered weakness, has dramatically improved; He is ranked 22nd on a tour to the stroke (.362) this season.

Mcilroy, John Rahm And other Sundays are capable of lifting Claret Jug, but how can you go against the chefler at this point? He did not finish out of the top 25 in each of each of its 15 on the PGA tour this season, and he was in the top 10 in each of its last 10.

Paolo uggetti: Yes, but with a warning. While Sheffler has not performed poorly on this chief, as Mark said, a golf course has some tension between the tendency of the chefler for fairness and the essence of the link golf, which can often stretched the line between fair and unfair.

However, it appears that the chefler is trying to hug it a little more. It also helps, that it considers portrash on the fair side of the link tracks, especially its pot bunker.

“I think some link courses I played, it was a kind of hit or miss when you went to a bunker what kind of lies you were going to get,” the chefler said. “The bunkers have a lot of slope, where the ball is like a funnel in the middle. I would argue that it can be slightly more fair than hitting a similar shot than two people and a man has to put it back into the bunker and another person has a clean lie.”

Nevertheless, as usual with a chefler, it can just come down to her insert. Although he has improved the region, he is coming to the Scottish Open in a week, where he was almost a stroke and half lost to the ground on the greens. This does not inspire confidence in their ability to handle another week of link surfaces.

“I think it is always most important to adjust to speed,” said the chefler. “Putting out of him, putting. Golf is still golf, whether you’re playing.”

What do you expect from Rory McLero this week?

Schlabach: I would be shocked, if it is not much better than last time, we saw McLeers competing in an open in Royal Portraus. At the first open championship in Northern Ireland in 68 years in 2019, Mcilroy seemed overwhelmed by the hopes of the crowd being favorite in its motherland.

On the first T, Mcilroy left his drive out of the border into the interior, causing a quadruple-band 8. He gave the card of double-bogie 5 on 16th and Triple-Bogi 7 on 18th, added 8-over 79 in the first round.

For the credit of Mcilroy, he rebounded to make seven Birds and a bogie in the second round, rally to cut with about 6-under 65.

“You meet in an open, this is a major championship, whatever comes with it, and I think it is feeling, first walking for tea and then that ovation, I was still a little surprised and a little surprised, like, ‘Gise,’ Giz, these people really want to win me,” McLOOI said this week.

“I think it came to my own pressure and more internally and did not really want to disappoint people. I think it’s just something that I did not prepare mentally for that day or that week. But I learned very quickly that one of my challenges, especially in a week, is controlling myself and controlling that fight.”

Mcilroy and Ireland Shane loriThe figure was again for the largest galleries after his post in 2019.

Mcilroy’s game looks in better place after its post-master winning; He finished sixth in the Travelers Championship and finished second in the Genesis Scottish Open.

He certainly has some fond memories of Royal Portrash: he recorded the course with 61 as 61 -year -old.

Uggetti: For all things about how McLaroy can be freed after winning their masters and what has been instead, it is ironic and appropriate that the place where he probably looks the most comfortable and stayed here in his element – in Scotland last week and Northern Ireland this week.

Mcilroy on Monday talked about embracing homecoming, which he knows that he is going to separate himself instead of separating the local fans as he did in 2019. You can already tell that he is doing this because he takes time to sign for fans and node and accepts them in his practice round.

Of course, no one matters if his game is not equal. The good news for Mcilroy is that it seems. In Scottish, McClaroy’s game looked faster since Masters and was satisfied where things are standing in the last head of the year.

“I am excited by my game where I have a game. I felt as if I showed some good signs last week,” said McLero, who finished second. “I think I am in a good place and not – it was not that there was a net preparation week last week, but I definitely feel like it has placed me in a good place.”

At this point, I would be more surprised if Mcilroy is not in the mixture then if it is compared to the weekend.

Consider protecting Xander Schaffele?

Schlabach: This is the last major championship of the year and the last shot in Glory, and the year -ridden champion Golfer can use something positive, which has been a lost season so far.

It is not as if Shoffel has played poorly this season; He has not cut 12 initially on 12 tour and seven top -25. His campaign seems incomplete only after missing for eight weeks with a painful rib injury. His best was a tie for the eighth and last week’s Scottish Open in Finnish Masters.

It is not difficult to find out why Shofel did not win in 2025 after catching its first two major in the PGA Championship and Open last season. He ranks 112nd on a tour in stroke from T (-018) and Putting (-144) in 138th.

Uggetti: The more I listen to Schaffele, I think he will win many open championships, whether this week or beyond.

It seems that he has an ideal attitude towards the link golf and attitude that he knows that it will be difficult, he knows that it will be unexpected and yet he is remembering the opportunity to grind anything through courses and conditions.

“This is just a mindset. I think, when you say a link golf, it comes with the season, and when you play in bad weather, you have to have a good attitude,” said Shofel. “You have to imagine a lot more than hitting your number on the machine.”

Schaffele did not have what I imagine that he is a follow -up that he expected a dream season last year, but is clearly trending in the right direction after T -12 in the US Open and T -8 in Scottish last week. If the conditions become uncontrolled at the end of this week, there are not many people you will rely on Excel. Schaffele is one of them.

What do you know about Royal Portrash and how do you expect to play this week

Schlabach: It is all dependent on the weather and air because the royal portrash is exposed to all elements at the northern end of northern Ireland.

It is being said that Lori and the rest of the region enjoyed the situation of incredible scoring in the first three rounds in 2019. The rain remained away and the winds calmed down, as Lori on Saturday gave a bogie-free 63 a card to set a 54-hal scoring records in the open.

Then on Sunday, torrential rain and stable winds blew up as lullabies and others.

“We will see how the weather changes this week,” said the chefler. “The weather has a very dramatic effect of how the golf course is going to play. You can play and prepare your practice round, but finally when you step on T on Thursday, the weather presenting is also going to be the strongest part of the test.”

Schaffele said that the wind can also affect golfers put.

“Putting is always difficult with the wind,” Shoffel said. “There are some holes where mounds cover greens and some holes that are more exposed where the wind is going to affect the ball on green. I think anyone who wins this week is a very well -goal player.”

Uggetti: It can be gettable (see 63 of Lowry in 2019) and it can also feel impossible on the basis of wind and direction strength. Above all, it will require a large amount of strategic decision making.

Case in case: During his Monday practice round, I noticed that McLero hit a driver in 400-yard equal 4 and then 3-Iron 474-yard equal 4. I argued her for a few minutes with my Cadi Harry Diamond that if it is barely played, what club to hit the tricky 15th hole.

As the chefler and others have reported, the portrash is a link course, but it is unique in the fact that most links are higher height changes than courses. It creates for an interesting combination of ground games and air games.

Players who can find out that when using one or the other is right, there will probably be the fighting on Sundays for Clact Jug.

A long shot that can be in dispute this week?

Schlabach: It was not long ago that 2022 US Open Champion Matte fitzpatric Described his game as “nonsense”, and it was some time when the English golfer was in a mixture in one of the Big Four until he was in the eighth position in the PGA Championships at the Qulel Holll Club in May.

The 30 -year -old does not have a great track record in the open, but he is coming in good form after tying the eighth in the rocket classic and fourth in the Scottish Open. If the weather becomes difficult over the weekend, then the fitzpatric conditions are capable of handling, just as he did in the Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, when he captured his first major.

Uggetti: how about Justin RoseNot only did he take McLero to a playoffs in the masters, but in the Royal Tron last year, Rose took a real shot to win over the back nine and came less than the shropl by only two shots.

An impressive Finnish is also coming in the Rose Scottish Open, where he shot 7 to jump to sixth place in the final round. It will be an epic story if we are able to score a 33 -year drought in the open if a major is capable of scoring another run in an open every day.