EXCLUSIVE: Swing guru Butch Harmon reveals he has been working with British No.1 Tommy Fleetwood to refine his game for Augusta National this week
Butch Harmon has backed Olympic silver medallist Tommy Fleetwood to win the Masters Green Jacket – and become golf ’s new superstar. Defending champion Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy are the two hot favourites for the first Major of the season starting in Augusta on Thursday. And world No.11 Fleetwood has yet to win on the other side of the Atlantic.
But the British No.1 has twice finished runner-up in Majors and recorded his best Masters performance last year when he was tied third. And swing guru Harmon, now 81, reckons the long-haired Ryder Cup hero is ready to join the greats after adapting his game for the “easiest” Major to win in Augusta.
Speaking from his academy in Las Vegas, the American said: “I will go away from choosing the two obvious ones in Rory and Scottie Scheffler and pick Tommy as my winner this week.
“His game suits Augusta very well. He is a right to left player. I have done some work with him this year trying to hit the ball a little higher going into the greens because the greens get very firm and fast. I think Tommy’s game suits Augusta.
“I have been working with Jose Maria Olazabal on his game the last few days and we were talking about Tommy at dinner. He was talking about what a great competitor he is and that his game fits Augusta National.
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“The question for Tommy is how well he will putt those greens because I know his long game is excellent. He struggles a little on the 15-footers and in – the ones you need to make a lot of. If he gets that sorted out, he will be in there with a real chance because his long game is very good for that golf course.
Harmon added: “I have been working with him for about two-and-a-half years and I have seen an increase in his self-belief during that time. It is one of the things I talk to him all the time. I tell him: ‘You need to understand how good you really are’.
“He would be such a great winner. He looks great and he would be such a popular winner – a new superstar. I think it would be great for golf if it did happen.”
Everton fan Fleetwood, 34, is the first player in PGA Tour history to earn over $25m (he has banked $26.8m in 150 events) without a win. And Harmon’s fellow Sky Sports analyst Sir Nick Faldo claimed: “Tommy’s got to fade the ball” to win in Augusta.
Harmon said: “He has never won on the PGA Tour but he has had a lot of seconds. He has had his chances – he puts himself in there. The key is, as long as you keep putting yourself in there, your time is going to come.
“He has won seven times on the DP World Tour, he was phenomenal in the Ryder Cup. If somebody goes out and beats you and you have played well. You have just got to take your hat off and say: I’ll get ‘em the next time.”
Harmon, whose father Claude Snr won the 1948 Masters, added: “It is just so hard to win these Majors. But having said that, the Masters is the easiest of all of them to win because there are only about 90 players in the field, a lot of those are former champions so they are not going to have a chance.
“A lot of them are first or second timers. Jack Nicklaus used to say that the field whittles down to only about 10 or 12 people who have a chance and I would definitely put Tommy Fleetwood in that category.”
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