![\"Leona](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/IRO6D6DNRNRYLZY62XXREJMGIQ.jpg\")
Leona Maguire of Ireland on the 11th during day one of the AIG Women’s Open 2026 at Royal Lytham & St Annes. Photograph: Peter Byrne\/PA Wire <\/p>\nNews that Charley Hull had slept for only three hours before her second round at the Women\u2019s Open fuelled an obvious conclusion. With noisy fallout continuing from the 30-year-old\u2019s prank on her caddie, it was assumed to be affecting her off the course. Not so, as it transpired. In typically emphatic style, Hull urged those who cannot accept criticism to \u201cgrow a pair of balls\u201d after signing for a resilient 71 at Royal Lytham & St Annes.<\/p>\n
After Hull tricked her bag man Adam Woodward into believing he had won \u00a3100,000 from a fake scratchcard, some of the reaction was fierce. Laura Davies, one of the greats of women\u2019s golf, called Hull\u2019s actions \u201cextremely cruel\u201d. After round one at Lytham, Hull told her detractors to \u201cloosen up\u201d. That, too, fuelled castigation of the Englishwoman. Rather than back down, she has doubled down.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou put yourself in the limelight so you would be silly to think there will not be comments like that,\u201d said Hull of the disapproval towards her.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think you see some people saying: \u2018I really struggle from these comments.\u2019 They\u2019re almost looking for sympathy. You\u2019re in such a good position in life. There are people way worse off in life and you\u2019re moaning about what people are saying about you.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just think like, I don\u2019t know, grow a pair of balls and just forget about it. Because if that\u2019s the worst thing in life, people saying bad stuff about you, you really have not got life that bad. My boyfriend said to me last night: \u2018Free publicity is good publicity. Today\u2019s newspaper is tomorrow\u2019s fish-and-chip paper.\u2019 I was like, yeah, true. Then we just laughed it off and then we haven\u2019t really spoken about it since.\u201d<\/p>\n
To everyone on the outside, though, this is an ongoing theme.<\/p>\n
It must be recognised that Woodward, Hull\u2019s long-time caddie, has shrugged off the episode. \u201cWhat people don\u2019t understand is mine and Adam\u2019s relationship,\u201d Hull added. \u201cWe\u2019re very, very close. He\u2019s like a big brother to me. He is one of my best friends. He came to Wimbledon with me the other week.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s always taking the mickey out of me. He thought the joke was brilliant himself. He was showing it. He was laughing hard about it.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen when you hear comments, so many people saying how bad it is, just lighten up. You obviously don\u2019t get my humour and I don\u2019t care if you don\u2019t get my humour.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy friends get my humour and that\u2019s why they\u2019re my friends. I wouldn\u2019t do it to a random person that I knew wouldn\u2019t take it very well. We all knew Adam, he is the king of pranks. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe amount of pranks he and his caddie mates have are way worse than that. So he\u2019s pretty chill. People need to chill out about that. Adam is loving the attention from it. He texted me last night saying this has been one of the funniest weeks ever because of that prank.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lost in this melee is the fact Hull is well-placed to win her first Major title. She may well remain the story of this tournament for different reasons than has been the case thus far.<\/p>\n
The highlight of day two was her bunker shot from greenside at the 17th, which found the bottom of the cup. A hole earlier and with her ball in a fairway divot, Hull twice backed off her approach after being distracted by a fidgety cameraman.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone makes mistakes sometimes,\u201d said Hull. \u201cBless him.\u201d Life around this golfer is never dull.<\/p>\n
In tougher conditions than Thursday, Hull\u2019s minus-two aggregate left her five adrift of the leader, Ryu Hae-ran. Ryu is seeking a third Major win in as many starts. Shiho Kuwaki is one adrift at six under. Hull\u2019s short sleep proved little hindrance. Leona Maguire missed the cut at five over, with Lauren Walsh at eight over and Anna Foster at 10 over.<\/p>\n
Leona Maguire of Ireland on the 11th during day one of the AIG Women’s Open 2026 at Royal Lytham & St Annes. Photograph: Peter Byrne\/PA Wire <\/p>\n
\u201cI slept 12 hours the night before,\u201d Hull said. \u201cAfter a late finish it takes me a while to wind down. I had a lot of adrenaline going through me. When you know you\u2019ve got to be up early you\u2019re like: \u2018I want to go to sleep\u2019 and then you can\u2019t sleep because you\u2019re thinking about going to sleep.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m quite weird, I can sleep for 16 hours straight. I\u2019ve slept for 20 hours before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hull\u2019s total has been matched, somewhat extraordinarily, by the Spanish amateur Paula Mart\u00edn Sampedro. When asked if she can win, the 20-year-old was admirably defiant. \u201cI think I can,\u201d she said. \u201cIf I play my best, I definitely can.\u201d Top amateur honours at least should be a formality in this form.<\/p>\n
Jeeno Thitikul\u2019s 73 slid her back to five-under-par. A missed cut for Georgia Hall at the venue where she won the 2018 Women\u2019s Open surely ends any lingering hopes of reaching this year\u2019s Solheim Cup.<\/p>\n
Team Europe will be confirmed on Monday, with the event taking place in the Netherlands in September. Megan Khang also headed for an early flight out of Lancashire with Miyu Yamashita, the 2025 champion, another to last only 36 holes. \u2013 Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News that Charley Hull had slept for only three hours before her second round at the Women\u2019s Open…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":836536,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[64,63,755,167311,146405,85],"class_list":["post-836535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-leona-maguire","tag-lpga-tour","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836535"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836535\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/836536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}