It doesn't seem 22 years since Tom Watson powered his way to the third of his five Open titles with an aggregate of 271, the lowest tally yet yielded by the stern links of Muirfield in its association with the championship, but then, Watson doesn’t look 52.

Yesterday, trim and fit as a flea, the American gave his views on links golf, the Tiger factor (it’s never far away) and the way the game is going.

He reckons the course is essentially the same as it was in 1980, though a good deal softer. "When I won in 1980, the fairways were very hard and the golf course was running."

Right now, the rain had made things a little easier and he also confessed himself rather surprised by the width of the fairways, some of which he considers generous. He adds, however, with the air of someone who thinks that things are just a touch too quiet - "If we get wind, anything can happen."

Winds were predicted for the rest of the week and he was sure the greens would firm up.

If conditions stayed the way they were yesterday - wet but fairly still - they would be conducive to low scoring, he said. "However, add a 20mph wind and it won’t be so easy. It’s all relative. I’ve come off a links course with a 71 which I’ve rated as being about three-over par. On the other hand, I considered the 68 I shot in the wind in the first-round of the 1980 Open to be the equivalent of six-under par."

He and Trevino led the field with matching scores that day and Watson regards the round as one of the finest he’s ever played.

He was relieved to see that the temptation to lengthen the course dramatically had been resisted. "You have to give credit to the R&A for not going too far back on the golf course," he said. "Let’s see how the course fares. I hear the members are already starting to complain a little bit, worried that their course is going to yield a lot of low scores and it very well could."

He knows that things can change practically by the hour on the links and that today’s flat calm can be tomorrow’s howling gale.

His form has been impressive. Edged out by Don Pooley in a play-off in the recent US Senior Open, Watson, who’d caught the eventual winner with a blistering last-round 67 was looking very like his old self, all brisk rhythm and power and the putter seemed to have taken a new lease of life.

Some weeks earlier, he had finished sixth in the Mastercard Colonial behind Nick Price.

Perhaps significantly, that was another course which, like Muirfield, tends to tame the power men by its subtle set-up rather than sheer length.

"I came here with high hopes of contending," said Watson. "I think I can play this golf course well." He is encouraged by the fact that the course often discourages the use of the driver. He agreed that this helped put him on an equal footing.

"There’s no question it helps me, because it equalises the length. When you talk about trying to make a golf course which equalises the whole field, you have to shorten it. You have to make it a short course so everyone is playing shorter shots to the greens."

He contrasted this concept with the set-up at Bethpage for the US Open when he was in no doubt that the USGA’s efforts to "Tiger-proof" the course had backfired and played into Woods’ hands. "Bethpage was right up Tiger’s alley because it only favoured about six golfers because of the length factor. The USGA made a huge mistake there."

The course, he contended, favoured only those players who could hit the ball over 300 yards. He instanced a run of 15 players at one point, none of whom managed to reach the tenth fairway. "That’s unfair. You favour accuracy. You don’t penalise straight."

If Bethpage came in for a bit of stick, Tiger was accorded nothing but praise. Watson’s caddy had described Woods as boring, but the old champion wasn’t having any of that. "I think it’s fantastic what Tiger is doing. He’s doing something that nobody else has done before - winning major championships like they’re club medals. This kid, he’s really, really good."

Watson recalled the epic evening after he’d won in 1980 when he and Ben Crenshaw, complete with attendant piper, issued forth onto the hallowed sward and played a couple of holes with hickory clubs. The spectacle was too much for the Muirfield secretary of the day who sped from the clubhouse and carried out a sort of citizen’s arrest on Crenshaw who was on the home green at the time.

At the secretary’s approach, Watson did a quick bunk, leaving Crenshaw to face the music. Did he now feel any remorse at having saved his own skin while his friend was being put to the sword? Apparently not. "The only reason Crenshaw got caught was because his wife, Polly, was wearing high heels at the time and aerating the eighteenth green.

"Any self-respecting secretary would see that as maybe not the right thing to be doing after the Open championship, albeit that the greens might be firm."

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