Rory McIlroy admits he can't have any excuses if he doesn't give himself a chance to win the US Masters this week. McIlroy has won the US Open and the US PGA Championship and finished third in the 2010 Open at St Andrews, but his best finish at Augusta National remains a tie for 15th in 2011, when he led by four shots going into the final round but crashed to a closing 80. Twelve months ago McIlroy arrived at the Masters on the back of a second-place finish in the Valero Texas Open which somewhat masked his struggles to adapt to new equipment, the 24-year-old having earlier walked off the course during his defence of the Honda Classic saying he was "in a bad place mentally." McIlroy also became embroiled in legal battles with his former management company and one of his sponsors, but eventually got his game back in shape and ended the year on a high with a victory in the Australian Open and successfully proposing to his tennis star girlfriend Caroline Wozniacki. And a final round of 65 in last week's Shell Houston Open meant the former world number 1 was in high spirits as he discussed his chances of following in the footsteps of Adam Scott on Sunday.
McIlroy told his pre-tournament press conference "Mind, body, equipment, it's all there. There's no excuses,.there's no excuses if I don't play well this week. Everything's in the right place to allow me to play well so it's just a matter of managing my expectations, not getting ahead of myself, not thinking about Sunday when it's Friday afternoon. Just really keeping myself in the present and in the moment and trying to take it one shot at a time and hopefully those shots add up to about 270 and I walk away with a green jacket. It's just about not getting ahead of yourself and just letting all the practice and all the work that you've put in come out in your execution and just get out of your own way."
