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Even then he had to hole the putt, as Clark had secured a birdie from 15 feet.”This is the best win of my career,” he said. “Against a field of that class and on such a good course, it ranks above anything I’ve done before. That second shot to the second play-off hole was the greatest I’ve ever made under pressure.”Torrance had planned to miss this event to be home for the birth of his third child, but when his daughter, Anouska, arrived a week early, he decided to come to Mount Juliet “I’m bloody glad I did,” he said. With 361,470 points, he is almost certain to face the Americans at Oak Hill in September.Torrance, who shot a one- under-par 71 in the final round proper for a total 277, secured his second win of the season when he rolled in a putt of 10 feet on the 518-yard par-five 17th for an eagle, after he drilled a three wood 243 yards to nine feet from the flag. Golf

GUY HODGSON
reports from Mount JulietA day pre-billed as a confrontation between Colin Montgomerie and Greg Norman for the Murphy’s Irish Open here proved to be anything but yesterday. Instead, Sam Torrance, who had not intended to play in the tournament, came through a three-man play-off to win at the second extra hole.The prize for beating Howard Clark and Stuart Cage in extra time was pounds 111,107, but it came gift-wrapped with a place in the European Ryder Cup team.

It was only a race.” Defeat, nevertheless, is not something that generally impinges upon Johnson’s world.”After everything Michael has done, expectation follows him everywhere he goes,” said Hunt But pressure is something he can handle “He doesn’t just need it, he thrives on it,” Hunt added “We know what times he’s ready to do.”Stand by world.. But as one prominent LA lawyer, Harland Braun, has pointed out, it “basically took a case that was overwhelming and created reasonable doubt”. Little was done to strip bare his silk-suited celebrity gloss, a factor which, in star-struck Los Angeles, could be decisive.Now the ball is in the court of Mr Simpson and his bevy of millionaire attorneys. Perhaps they will produce a surprise -proof that he did not knife anyone to death, and that there is an innocent explanation for the trail of blood from the murder scene to his mansion.

If they don’t, and Mr Simpson walks free, America’s disaffection with the institutions of government will only grow deeper.. It has been the week of the grovel. Seldom has that rule of politics “never apologise, never explain” been so comprehensively scuppered This is partly the fault of John Major. Thanks to him, the politicians who supported the wrong candidate had to swallow their words. There was a particular pleasure to be had in watching so many Conservative politicians imitating the behaviour of Bolsheviks when they too confessed that their admiration for the great leader was immortal, even if their lives were about to end

But that is only the start of the chain. The political correspondents who confidently predicted that the man was finished had to explain to their editors why they got it wrong. Those leader writers who called for Mr Major’s head had to explain to their readers why the advice of the newspaper was not taken.

And the editors had to explain to their foreign proprietors why, just occasionally, the views of Tory MPs might differ from those of millionaire newspaper owners.
But if grovelism has been pretty rare in politics (and even rarer in the press), politicians are fast learners. Their trick has been to adapt the various gradations of grovel from professions more experienced in the craft, in particular the sport and entertainment industries – gradations that range from the abject grovel (Hugh Grant’s moment of insanity) to the minimalist version (Mike Atherton blaming it all on the pitch).Towards the Hugh Grant end of the scale came the comment from the Daily Telegraph: “Painful though it may be to admit as much,” the MPs’ decision would “force a brief spell of humility upon the scribblers”. Among MPs, Norman Lamont, not noted for any spell of humility, managed a fair degree of Grantism by declaring the victory “a clear win” and urging the party to unite. Most Redwood supporters chose the middle-of-the-pack grovel, while only a handful, like Graham Riddick, chose the minimalist version, commenting: “He just scraped in by the skin of his teeth.” Given that his previous grovelling has involved explaining his cash-for-questions episode, maybe he felt that two exercises in Grantism a year would be de trop.That may be unwise.