Rory McIlroy has accepted a two-shot penalty at the Abu Dhabi Championship after being deemed to have improved his lie by pressing a club into the ground. The incident occurred before he played his fourth stroke on the 12th hole, which was McIlroy's second chip shot from the rough at Yas Links during Thursday's opening round.
His first chip from just off the green rolled back down a hill to his feet and settled in a divot where McIlroy appeared to move a tuft of grass by pressing down on it with his club. After taking six shots to complete the par-four, that double-bogey became a quadruple one after being unable to say whether he had pressed the club into the ground or not.
DP World Tour statement
The DP World Tour released a statement after his round. It says: "Rory McIlroy was penalised two strokes under Rule 8.1b(4) for his actions immediately before playing his fourth stroke, his second chip shot from the rough, on the 12th hole during round one of the Abu Dhabi Aldar Championship.
"Rule 8.1b(4) permits a player to ground their club lightly right in front of or behind the ball. 'Ground the club lightly' means allowing the weight of the club to be supported by the grass on or above the ground surface and there is no penalty even if the lie is improved. However, a player is not allowed to press the club on the ground.
"Having reviewed the footage, McIlroy was unable to say whether he had pressed the club on the ground or not. However, given his concern over perception of the footage, he was not comfortable proceeding without penalty. He therefore chose to apply a two stroke penalty."
McIlroy's response
Speaking about what was said in the scorer's hut, McIlroy explained: "They showed me a video from 12. Hit my first chip shot from down the bottom of the hill, didn't get up, came back down and rolled into a divot, and then as I went to sort of just get a feel for the lie, the close-up of the camera, you can see, like, a little piece of grass around the divot sort of lies down as I put my club down behind the ball; the grass doesn't return to its original position.
"There's no intent. I play by the rules. I try to do everything that I can to never end up in these positions. But just by looking at the video, it doesn't look very good. That wasn't my intent; I'm just trying to get a feel for the lie. The ball's in a sort of bottom of a sandy divot, and I'm trying to feel like I can get a 54-degree onto the back of the ball.
"But in the process, this piece of grass is laid down. The technical term for the rule is: if you press down on the piece, I don't feel like I pressed down, but at the same time, I don't want people to perceive that I got away with something either, so I'm happy to take the two-shot penalty and move on and move into tomorrow."
Impact on leaderboard
The two-shot penalty leaves McIlroy in joint-33rd on two-under par with 11 other players, including friend Tommy Fleetwood. They are eight shots off Francesco Laporta, who shot a ten-under 72, and has a three-shot lead over the field, with Bernd Wiesberger, Jon Rahm and Sam Bairstow tied for second on seven-under.
