Rory McIlroy accuses Bryson DeChambeau of holding Open ‘hostage’ after penalty

By Carl Markham, Press Association

Masters champion Rory McIlroy delivered an extraordinary rebuke to a “performative” Bryson DeChambeau and accused the American of holding the tournament “hostage” over his rules controversy at The Open.

The Northern Irishman’s dislike of the two-time US Open winner is well known and he refused to speak to him when they played together during the final round of his 2025 win at Augusta which brought him the career grand slam.

But he said it out loud when asked for his thoughts on how the American had behaved late into the night on Friday, which delayed the publication of the third-round tee-times until around 11pm and prompted criticism from a number of players, with England’s Marco Penge calling it “a joke”.

“Late night for everyone,” said McIlroy.

“I won’t pretend to be up here and defend Bryson. I’m not particularly fond of him. I think a lot of it’s performative. I think a lot of it’s for attention.

“To hold the tournament hostage like that, and to have all of us, players, volunteers, everyone waiting on him to depart, I didn’t feel like it was a great look.”

DeChambeau objected to a two-stroke penalty imposed after a round of 66 for improving the area of his backswing by standing on a large tuft of high grass at Royal Birkdale.

He requested to be driven out to the scene of the incident on the fifth hole where he spent a lengthy period remonstrating with officials before returning to the scoring compound for further discussions.

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The American then heading to the practice ground – with murmurings about him possibly pulling out of the tournament – to hit balls for almost an hour until he left at 10.30pm.

There has been plenty of debate about the rights and wrongs about the infringement but the general consensus was that the R&A were correct.

McIlroy added: “I was watching it live. I was up in the players’ lounge watching it with a few other players and as soon as he made the step into the ball we all sort of looked at each other, and we were like, ‘That didn’t seem right’.

“Then when I heard that he was called in by the rules officials it was pretty obvious for why.

“I think there’s no doubt that he improved the line of his backswing. Whether it was careless or whether it was intentional, I don’t think it matters.

“Hopefully it was careless, but I think the two-shot penalty was justified for sure.”

While the two-shot penalty dented DeChambeau’s prospects, dropping him from second place on seven under and one off the lead, it was not as damaging to him as McIlroy’s struggles on the greens were to the six-time major winner.

Highlight of his round of 69, leaving him two under for the tournament and out of contention, was a 348-yard drive just short of the ninth green and a chip in for eagle, which left the Northern Irishman looking somewhat bemused.

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“It was a little scrappy in areas. I feel like I could have probably shot 67 or 66 and if I’m three back of Foxy (clubhouse leader Ryan Fox on eight under) going into tomorrow I feel like I have a legitimate chance,” said McIlroy.

“But I’m three back of that. I probably feel like I’m a little too far behind.

“Never say never. If I go out tomorrow and get to double digits, you never know, but I certainly am not going out tomorrow thinking like I’ve got a great chance to win.

“I feel like my speed (on the greens) has just never quite been right for the entire week, and when your speed’s not right, it’s obviously hard to hole putts.”