Let’s start at the Alstom Open de France in Paris where I didn’t actually play that bad but didn’t putt that great. I came off on the course on Thursday and spent a couple of hours on the putting green with Brendan and changed my set up and posture and started rolling the ball really well, did better in the second round but unfortunately missed the cut by one.

I then came back to London for a day and then went over to Adare Manor for the JP McManus Invitational Pro-Am. I played and putted nicely and managed to win which was very pleasing as the field was strong. The event was brilliant and JP looks after us all so well and raises huge amounts of money so it was great to part of that, and come out on top!

I came over to Loch Lomond and played nicely in the Pro-Am on the Wednesday. I then got myself into a great position after three rounds but got off to a bad start on Sunday, and with the course playing so tough it was hard to get back on track. Anyway I hung in there and ground it out and when it became apparent that I wasn’t going to win, my next priority was to make sure that I got the spot available for St Andrews, which I did.

All credit must go to the European Tour and Loch Lomond for getting the course in such great condition as it had been plagued with bad weather during the winter and a few greens had to be re-laid to get things in order for the event.

Barclays, as always, put on a fantastic event and it’s always great to spend some time with the boss, Bob Diamond.

The Open Championship at St Andrews is always the most special of all Open venues and when I missed out in the qualifying event at Sunningdale I was pretty much down in the dumps – so it’s a great feeling to be the last man in for this week.

So I’m now here at St Andrews and hopefully I can keep the form going that I showed last week – I love the course here which has been very good to me in the past so I’m really looking forward to the week.

Will report in again soon. Darren.