Lawrie bids for further glory

Paul Lawrie secured his place alongside Europe's finest with victory at the Open - and he does not plan to stop there.

The popular Scot took advantage of the biggest collapse in the championship's history as Frenchman Jean Van de Velde sensationally gave Lawrie and Justin Leonard a play-off reprieve after throwing away a three-shot lead at the final hole.

And while victory secures Lawrie's debut at the Ryder Cup and US Masters, the Aberdeen golfer is refusing to rest on his one major success.

"I said to my coach in the car coming over here that there's no way that we're going to sit back," said Lawrie at a news conference.

"Obviously it's great to win and it's nice sitting here but this is just the start. Now I feel that everything is up to us to work even harder now to go on and win more tournaments.

"There's no way I'll be sitting back and happy with one good trophy."

The 30-year-old Scot will now take a week off and cherish the moment but he is back for the European Open at the K Club in Ireland before battling it out in the Scandinavian Masters.

Lawrie, however, is looking beyond that and to the US PGA before making his Ryder Cup bow and he insists he will approach every event in much the same way.

"I'll be going to the US PGA the same way as I go into every tournament and try to focus on one shot at a time," he said.

"I'll try and do what I need to do and obviously there'll be a little bit more hype when I get there and people will be asking what Lawrie's doing, that's the whole part of it."

Lawrie admits that he was surprised as anyone to be given a play-off chance but he hopes the 128th Open will be remembered for his success rather than Van de Velde's amazing disaster on the final hole.

Lawrie said: "He really should have won, there's no doubt about that. I don't know quite what he was thinking, I didn't speak to him about it and obviously didn't want to speak to him about it.

"All he's got to do is chip it down the fairway and make five at worse. He had a nightmare but that's for him to decide what he did or what went wrong.

"No disrespect to him - I'm glad he did what he did but I think I'd have chipped it down the fairway myself.

"I personally feel he should have won but he didn't, that's the thing. He didn't do what he had to do and you go out and it's an all-round package. You've got to go out and chip good, putt good and think good and he didn't have one of the parts of the jigsaw."