Organisers of The Open golf championship at Portrush delivered a highly successful event in a land scorched by recent sporting failure. The collapse of plans to host matches in football's Euro 2028 tournament in Belfast damaged Northern Ireland's reputation in the world of sport.

Rory McIlroy couldn't have asked for much more at Royal Portrush, save one thing. But there just happens to be one man unparalleled in his generation.

Chris Gotterup had another good week on the British Isles, following his victory in the Scottish Open with solo third at Royal Portrush and $1,128. That pushes him from 51 st to 30 th with $3,714,337. He’s earned more than $2.7 million in the last two weeks.

Scottie Scheffler continued his run of dominance on Sunday, winning the Open Championship by four strokes, his third major championship in the past two years and fourth overall.

Six years after his emotional missed cut at Royal Portrush, McIlroy stuck around for four days of heavy praise from the hometown crowd, which showered McIlroy all the way through his 10-under performance and T-7 finish.

How to watch every single shot from the biggest names in golf throughout Round 4 at the 2025 Open Championship

So here is our final major big board of the year, ranking the top 30 golfers in the field. This is not simply the 30 best golfers in a vacuum. These are the 30 golfers that our crack team of Gabby Herzig, Hugh Kellenberger and Brody Miller believe are best suited to win this week at Royal Portrush.

After Rory McIlroy fell short at The Open, Belfast Live considers some of the talking points at Royal Portrush, including one player's grovelling apology