Irish Open moves to Royal Portrush

Royal Portrush Golf Club on the scenic Causeway coast on County Antrim will be unveiled today as the new home of the Irish Open.

The decision to move the European Tour event northward from Killarney, Co Kerry, in the Irish Republic comes on the back of the achievements of Northern Ireland’s three major winners in the last two years.

Darren Clarke’s emotional victory in the Open Championship at Royal St George’s in Kent last summer followed the successive US Open victories of Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy. All three players – McDowell and Clarke have homes in Portrush – backed the event at the town’s famous links.

Clarke and McDowell both welcomed the decision.

“Fantastic news on the Irish Open 2012 coming to Royal Portrush,” McDowell told his Twitter followers. “Always been a dream of mine to play a top event in my home town.”

Clarke urged fans to pack the fairways come June. “Royal Portrush will be awesome for the Irish Open this year... it’s as good a test as we play anywhere!” he tweeted. “Brilliant news. Big crowds please!!!”

It is hoped that a successful staging of the Irish Open this summer – the event will be from 28 June to 1 July – will add further momentum to the campaign to bring the Open Championship itself back to Northern Ireland. The Open has only been staged in the region once before, at Royal Portrush in 1951.

But the three major wins by local golfers prompted a clamour for a return and heaped pressure on governing body the Royal and Ancient to bring the tournament across the Irish Sea.

After Clarke’s win last year, R&A chief executive Peter Dawson pledged to look again at the issue and John Dallat, Northern Ireland Assembly member for East Londonderry, said securing the Irish Open could open the way for a major return.

“Anything is now possible,” he said. “Confidence at that level has now been bestowed on the club, so why not?”