Final Shot with Michael Campbell

The 2005 US Open champion, who covered the Masters Tournament and US Open as an analyst for Singapore-based Fox Sports, talks to Alex Jenkins about his return from a debilitating ankle injury, his fluctuating form and, of course, that brilliant victory at Pinehurst where he held off Tiger Woods to win his first major championship

1995 - his rookie year on the European Tour

On winning the Eisenhower Trophy with New Zealand in 1992 and turning pro …

I was very, very lucky. In my first pro event in Australia I finished seventh; in my second I finished second and then I won my third event. These were all events in Australia and so I made the transition from amateur to pro very quickly. The other three guys in the [Eisenhower Trophy] team struggled and missed cuts. I took the lift and those guys took the stairs. I was lucky.

On the International Team’s poor Presidents Cup record …

The biggest problem is that there’s no unity between the players; there’s so many different cultures and languages. You have to have unity and that’s what’s missing right now. We’ve had great captains - I played under Peter Thomson and Gary Player - but you just have to have that connection between the players. That’s my view.

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Written by Alex Jenkins

Photography by AFP

Click here to see the published article.

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