How Cameron Smith surged at St. Andrews and stole the show from Rory McIlroy at The Open

ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — Out of the turn emerged the winner of the 150th Open.

While the whole of St. Andrews was following Rory McIlroy, Cameron Smith, a group ahead, strung together a run of five birdies in a row to leap to the top of the leaderboard through 14 holes. An hour or so later, Smith’s name was being carved into the Claret Jug.

He never blinked once Sunday. The first time he looked slightly rattled was when he held the trophy.

“What a week — I’m going to fall apart here I know,” he said.

But if there was one thing he never did over these past four days, it was crumble, despite a difficult Saturday.

A day before he was announced as Champion Golfer of the Year, Smith was weighing up where it had all gone wrong. He’d carded a round of 73. He looked dejected. He talked of how the golfing gods had gone against him. He regretted how he had attacked the 13th with gusto, instead of playing it carefully — and walked away with double bogey.

The optimism we saw from him in the first two rounds had momentarily ebbed away, leaving us with what we thought would be a straight shootout between the overnight leaders — McIlroy and Viktor Hovland — for the championship. But Smith hadn’t lost hope — far from it.

“I think I was really frustrated [Saturday] with how the round went,” he said. “I just really put it down to links golf. So I shrugged it off pretty good. I really didn’t dwell on it too much.”

On Sunday, Smith started dancing again, with the Australian support behind him. With the focus elsewhere — mostly on McIlroy — he put together another flawless round just like he did on Friday, shooting 8-under 64 to gate-crash what was meant to be McIlroy’s coronation.

Once Smith had birdied the last hole, he had a 2-shot lead over McIlroy. He walked off to sign his scorecard as the crowd all flocked to the fairway praying for a miracle. But the minute McIlroy’s drive came up short of the green, and his attempt to hole out for an eagle to force a playoff slipped…