Andrew Redington/Getty Images
Hatton reacts to a less than perfect approach shot to 12 during the second round of the DP World Tour Championship on Friday.

By Kent Gray
When Hideki Matsuyama hits a golf shot that isn’t otherworldly, he’ll instantly give you a clue. A silent look of disgust is often accompanied by a disconsolate slump of the shoulders. If he really doesn’t like the strike, the offending club may even be gently relinquished at the top of his backswing, left on the ground for his caddie to pick up and admonish for insubordination.

Chances are, the result is not as bad as the (over)-reaction, sometimes quite the opposite in fact. The Japanese star is golf’s master of the poker-face. You think his hand is lousy but it turns out to be a straight flush after all.

Tyrrell Hatton is no Hideki Matsuyama and yet sometimes he is. After just about every shot, you know exactly what the Englishman is thinking. Often he’ll voice his displeasure to caddie Mick Donaghy, the canny Scottish bagman who seems to be good at letting it go in one ear and out the other.

Hatton’s second round at the DP World Tour Championship Friday was one of those especially expressive days. If you used his reactions alone as your leaderboard, you’d figure Hatton was a frustrated also-ran. But it turns out all the grumpy, argumentative, disbelieving looks added up to a bogey-free, four-under 68 on the Earth layout at Jumeirah Golf Estates. He was still frustrated – that’s par for the course for Hatton – but at -7 through 36 holes, he’s just three strokes adrift of leader Patrick Reed and still very much in the final sprint for the Race to Dubai title.

Up in the TV commentary booth, former Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley summed it up nicely.

“Yes, Patrick can win with his ‘B’ game,” McGinley said. “He is one of the best at winning when he’s not quite on. He’s great at churning out a 69 or 70. But the English guys are the biggest challengers, with Hatton, who is three back on seven under par, the most dangerous of those.

“Tyrrell is such a tough competitor. And he can go head-to-head with Reed. [Tyrrell] has won in Europe and America this year. He really is something special. And, like Patrick, he can win without his best stuff—we saw that [in his win at the BMW PGA Championship] at Wentworth a couple of months ago.”

Typically refreshing, Hatton didn’t sugarcoat his feelings in his post-round interview. What was the key to being the only player to go bogey-free on Friday, Tyrrell?

“A bit of luck when I needed it,” said the 29-year-old whose 2020 also includes victory at the PGA Tour’s prestigious Arnold Palmer Invitational.

“I think the score is quite generous for how I played. I didn’t feel that comfortable out there. On the course I was kind of tinkering and trying to find something. Obviously happy to go bogey-free and in a decent position going into the weekend.

“From memory, I don’t think there was too many shots that were really bad, like where I was in a sort of difficult position, so I guess my misses ended up okay.”

Hatton’s frustration extended till the last hole when he narrowly avoided the creek with his drive only to end up in a lush lie. He tinkered with hitting a fairway wood but eventually opted for the sensible option of a lay-up, wedge in. There was no birdie but no damage done either.

“Yeah, I really wanted to go for it, but as I stood over it, I was like, it would be stupid. The 3-wood wasn’t just kind of — it didn’t want to go into the grass at all. The grass seemed quite hard, so there was just no point. So I just hit a 7-iron up there, tried to give myself a decent number and didn’t hit a great wedge shot in, unfortunately.”

Ah well. You’re still in it and have the chance to add to “two massive wins”. It must be nice to have the freedom to “just go for this and really try and win the tournament and also the Race to Dubai?”

“Yeah, I’m not really thinking about all that kind of stuff, just trying to go out there and play my best each day and try and give myself an opportunity come Sunday and see what happens.”

We’ll all see what happens. It will be written all over Tyrrell Hatton’s face.