The Irishman has only played one competitive event north of the border, winning the Irish Amateur Close at Portstewart in 1995, but will tee it up alongside heroes of the game at Galgorm over the next three days looking to make it another special week.<\/p>\n
Former Masters champion, Ryder Cup captain and World No.1 Ian Woosnam headlines a star-studded field at the Co Antrim venue that also includes the likes of David Howell, Phillip Price, Thomas Levet, Peter Baker and Stephen Gallacher.<\/p>\n
But Murphy is hoping to be the best of the lot and pick up his first Legends Tour victory at Galgorm, hoping that past glories will spur him on.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really excited. I think this is my first time playing a professional tournament in Northern Ireland, which is pretty cool,\u201d smiled Murphy.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the Irish Opens I played were always down south. I did win the Irish Amateur in Northern Ireland at Portstewart, though, so I\u2019m kind of one-for-one up here \u2014 which is a nice stat. Hopefully I can double my strike rate this week.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although he has never played at Galgorm previously, Murphy does have experience there having walked the fairways as part of his other job as a commentator for Sky Sports.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m hoping it\u2019s as easy with the clubs as it was with the microphone, that\u2019s my wish for the week,\u201d he laughed.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a great golf course, I was actually surprised at just how good it was. With the great summer we\u2019ve had, I expect it\u2019ll play fast again like it did then.<\/p>\n
\u201cCommentating gives a very different perspective. You become familiar with the course\u2019s nuances and you\u2019re essentially playing the course without fear, because you\u2019re focused on explaining what players should do and how. That insight can help free you up when you\u2019re actually playing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe targets are tough and there\u2019s plenty of danger out there \u2014 which you don\u2019t feel with a microphone in hand, but you definitely do with a golf club!\u201d<\/p>\n
Although he is still waiting for that elusive first win on the Legends Tour, Murphy has been steadily improving, including shooting rounds of 62 at Doonbeg and 63 at Portmarnock recently.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt shows there\u2019s a lot of good stuff in the tank,\u201d says Murphy. \u201cIt\u2019s just about relaxing and enjoying the challenge of tournament golf again.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s tough because I\u2019m working and playing part-time, trying to compete with guys who are full-time. But you\u2019ve got to have hope. I\u2019d love a few more days in the sun, competing with these great players. The standard is ferocious every week, so I\u2019ll need my A-game to contend.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Irishman has only played one competitive event north of the border, winning the Irish Amateur Close at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":98524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[48325,48324,5904,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-98523","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-adam-mckendry","9":"tag-antrim-sport","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}