Justin Thomas received an enthusiastic reception as he kicked off his preparations for The Open Championship at Royal Birkdale on Monday, and he praised the backing of British spectators.<\/p>\n
Thomas<\/a> is aiming to expand his collection of two major championships, and he openly expressed his appreciation for golf<\/a> and its supporters in this region.<\/p>\n British enthusiasts usually have just two chances annually – the Scottish Open and The Open – to watch the PGA Tour’s elite players compete on home soil, and Thomas was met by numerous families seeking photographs and autographs following a practice round with Jake Knapp, Alistair Docherty and 2017 Claret Jug champion Jordan Spieth.<\/p>\n Thomas happily accommodated the requests, and he subsequently shared with Mirror U.S. Sports his regard for the British golfing audience.<\/p>\n He said, “It’s cool. Obviously, this is the only chance that a lot of people here get to see us play, but they are very respectful fans.<\/p>\n “The appreciation for golf in itself, and how you have to play the golf over here, everything like that. I really, really enjoy my time playing in The Open, and the Scottish Open as well. It’s a great time.”<\/p>\n Thomas’ fondness for links golf and The Open has developed despite posting a disappointing record in this tournament by his elevated standards; a T11 finish at Royal Portrush in 2019 stands as his strongest showing in golf’s oldest major.<\/p>\n The former world No. 1 has endured a disappointing season, with just one top-five finish – a T4 at the PGA Championship – to show for his efforts.<\/p>\n The 33-year-old underwent microdiskectomy surgery to address a herniated disk in his back during the fall, and he remains generally pleased with how his game has progressed since his March comeback.<\/p>\n He feels he’s merely one solid round away from everything falling into place. “It feels good,” he said of his game.<\/p>\n “I mean, I got off to whatever start, just coming back from surgery, but I’ve played really solid or consistent since.<\/p>\n “The last couple of months, I’ve just had kind of one [bad] round or something, and that’s kind of held me back from having a couple more top fives or more chances to win.<\/p>\n “So just keep doing what I’m doing and sharpen things up a little bit.”<\/p>\n Thomas reacquainted himself with links golf at the Scottish Open last week, though he’ll be hoping that a three-over-par final round resulting in a T50 finish at The Renaissance Club isn’t an omen for what lies ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Justin Thomas received an enthusiastic reception as he kicked off his preparations for The Open Championship at Royal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38442,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[4296,1516],"class_list":["post-38441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-justin-thomas","tag-golf-section","tag-justin-thomas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}