{"id":62781,"date":"2026-09-08T10:57:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T10:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/62781\/"},"modified":"2026-09-08T10:57:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T10:57:09","slug":"jon-rahm-irelands-always-been-a-very-special-place-to-me-in-my-heart-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/62781\/","title":{"rendered":"Jon Rahm: \u2018Ireland\u2019s always been a very special place to me in my heart\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Who knows exactly what the future holds for LIV<\/a>? If Jon Rahm<\/a> knows, he isn\u2019t saying. For now, the Spaniard is dipping his toes back into his old life on the DP World Tour<\/a>. He plans to also play next week\u2019s BMW PGA at Wentworth, while any appearance at next month\u2019s Spanish Open remains contingent on the arrival date of a new baby.<\/p>\n

But in the here and now he is focused on a quest to win a third Amgen Irish Open<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Rahm and Rory McIlroy are the only multiple winners of the Irish Open in this week\u2019s field. And while McIlroy\u2019s two were both achieved at The K Club, Rahm\u2019s came on links terrain – at Portstewart in 2017 and up the coast at Lahinch in 2019.<\/p>\n

He had a wry grin as he reflected on his initial attempts to get acquainted with the Doonbeg<\/a> links on Monday, which were thwarted by sudden, intense downpours. After three holes, he\u2019d had enough, and ditched the familiarity mission for a day in hooking up with Tom McKibbin, Liam Nolan and Thomas Higgins, who is making his professional debut.<\/p>\n

Rahm\u2019s work at LIV is done for the season, and most likely forever given the uncertainty over its financial viability; and the world number 14\u2019s return to regular European Tour events here marks the first time since the Genesis Scottish Open in July that he has played in one other than a LIV event or a Major.<\/p>\n

\"'I‘I don\u2019t know why, but Ireland\u2019s always been a very special place to me in my heart.’ Jon Rahm at the International Golf Links, Doonbeg, Clare. Photograph: Ben Brady\/Inpho <\/p>\n

The appeal of playing golf in Ireland is a strong one for the man from the Basque region of north-western Spain, those two wins cementing that connection \u2013 that first at Portstewart providing his breakthrough win on the DP World Tour before he claimed his two Major championships, the US Open in 2021 and the Masters in 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a professional golfer, when you come [to Ireland] and you feel that appreciation, it\u2019s really special. It\u2019s unique. I don\u2019t know why, but Ireland\u2019s always been a very special place to me in my heart. And as golf destinations go, if anybody everybody ever asks me, I always say, \u2018if you can go to Ireland for 10 days, you are not going to get better than that!\u201d<\/p>\n

Of his upcoming schedule post-Irish Open and the BMW PGA, Rahm confirmed: \u201cIt hasn\u2019t changed from what I want to do. I\u2019m playing here, I\u2019m playing next week. I\u2019m planning on playing Abu Dhabi and Dubai depending what goes on in that part of the world. Spanish Open? It all depends on when the little one decides to arrive. I hope I can be there, but we will see. It\u2019s one of those things where family always comes first, and as much as I love the Spanish Open, if I have to choose, obviously it\u2019s an easy choice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who knows exactly what the future holds for LIV? If Jon Rahm knows, he isn\u2019t saying. For now,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[7984,127,3215,528,16209],"class_list":["post-62781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jon-rahm","tag-doonbeg","tag-dp-world-tour","tag-irish-open","tag-jon-rahm","tag-liv-golf-invitational-series"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62781","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=62781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}