[Photo: Gary Lisbon]
It was the moment that defined Wednesday at the Crown Australian Open and lit a fuse within Australian – and world – golf-course architecture circles.
Rory McIlroy, the career Grand Slam winner, world No.2 and global golfer, declaring in no uncertain terms that Royal Melbourne is “not the best course in Melbourne”. Instead, Kingston Heath is, in his mind.
RELATED: Rory’s HUGE Royal Melbourne call
Firstly, the Northern Irishman deserves credit for not simply ‘straight-batting’ his answer to yesterday’s question about Royal Melbourne Golf Club, which would have been so easy to do.
But we’ve been here before – 37 years ago, to be exact.
Jack Nicklaus set tongues wagging at the Bicentennial Classic in 1988 when he described Royal Melbourne as a “good members’ course”. Nicklaus didn’t view the comment as a put-down; rather as a compliment. Similarly, McIlroy was quick to note that he still considers the Composite course as a top-10-in-the-world layout.
There is a corner within golf-course architecture that agrees with McIlroy that Kingston Heath is indeed the superior layout. Likewise in Adelaide, where venerable Royal Adelaide always ranks higher than nearby Kooyonga, however the latter has a definite and occasionally vocal following that argues it should be the other way around.
RELATED: The ultimate double – playing Royal Melbourne and Cape Wickham in consecutive days
As the person who administers Australian Golf Digest’s biennial Top 100 Golf Courses ranking, I can tell you that in the most recent list (2024), nearly 15 percent of panellists who evaluated both Royal Melbourne and Kingston Heath scored ‘The Heath’ higher. That, however, was just the West course at ‘RM’ and not the Composite, which is a key distinction here.
When our ranking elevated Cape Wickham above Royal Melbourne West last year for the first time in the list’s near-40-year history, we made that exact point: the Composite course – if ranked instead of East and West – would surely be untouchable at the top.
So in one sense McIlroy is not alone in his views. He’s not in the majority, but nor is he ‘on an island’ on this one.
Yet as former tour player-turned coach Bradley Hughes noted on X/Twitter, McIlroy needs to see Royal Melbourne in more ways than he has:
I’d also argue that McIlroy made his call prematurely. He’s not seen Royal Melbourne in all its guises. But that’s about to change.
This morning the 36-year-old will tee off amid northerly winds that intensify the challenge of Royal Melbourne on a day that’s predicted to reach 34 degrees Celsius. Tomorrow, the wind is expected to come from the south, south-west. On Saturday, it switches to come in from the west before quartering from the south-west on Sunday when the top temperature will dip to 18 degrees.
It’s a vintage four-day stretch of late spring/early summer weather that will highlight the nuances in Alister MacKenzie and Alex Russell’s design and showcase its many faces and overall brilliance.
RELATED: Conquering the Composite course
There’s also a case to be made that someone with McIlroy’s prodigious driving capabilities is not the best-placed golfer to pass judgment. He noted on Tuesday that he expected to hit no more than five drivers per round during the Australian Open. At tour level, the grand old course is too short in 2025 to fully challenge the best players off the tee. And someone of McIlroy’s length has his greatest asset handcuffed by such a layout. That surely plays a part in his thinking.
Regardless, McIlroy will be better placed to opine about the Royal Melbourne vs Kingston Heath debate after four more ‘reps’ under his belt come Sunday night.
Or Friday night if he fails to properly figure out the test.
