Shane Lowry cut a frustrated figure during the second round of the Open Championship, having accepted a two-stroke penalty after he was adjudged to have caused his ball to move
Sky Sports were forced to apologise after Shane Lowry dropped an F-bomb on a difficult second day at The Open at Royal Portrush. Lowry, 38, finds himself 10 shots off leader Scottie Scheffler after the second round on Friday, during which he accepted a two-stroke penalty.
The R&A judged that the Irishman had caused his ball to move during a practice swing on the 12th hole. Lowry, who lifted the famous Claret Jug at Portrush in 2019, said that he didn’t see it move and but accepted the penalty to avoid being called a ‘cheat’.
But his frustration wasn’t confined to just one incident as the rigours of Portrush tool their toll. After hitting a wayward tee shot, Lowry blasted: “F*** off, f*** this place.”
Sky Sports commentator Ewan Murray quickly apologised to viewers who were watching live coverage of day two by saying: “Sorry about the language slipping through there.”
It summed up a challenging day for Lowry, who was ‘disappointed’ with the penalty decision before he birdied and survived the cut by one stroke. “The last thing I want to do is sit there and argue and not take the penalty and then get slaughtered all over social media tonight for being a cheat,” the Irishman explained.
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“I’m disappointed that they don’t have more camera angles on it. The one zoomed in slow motion – they’re trying to tell me if it doesn’t move from the naked eye, if you don’t see it moving, it didn’t move. I told them I definitely was looking down towards the ball as I was taking that practice swing, and I didn’t see it move.”
Scheffler, Lowry’s playing partner and the world No.1, felt that the 2019 champion was put in a ‘tough position’. “Ultimately in golf it’s up to the player, and I felt like Shane was put in a pretty tough situation there when they were zooming in on his golf ball,” Scheffler said.
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“In the rough it’s hard to tell. It was a very tough spot for Shane to be put in. He handled it really well. It’s obviously very frustrating. It’s frustrating for me as a competitor of his and a player to watch him after kind of deal with that because the last thing you want to be known in the game of golf is somebody who cheats.
“I’m not going to state a strong opinion here in the media on whether or not I thought he deserved the penalty, but all I’m going to say is it was a very tough situation for him to be put in, and I thought he handled it really well.”
