Rory McIlroy admits that his strong finish at the PGA Championship is papering over some of the cracks in his game after he finished tied for seventh place at Oak Hill.
A disappointing opening round of 71 meant that McIlroy was always up against it at the PGA Championship, and while he recovered with three consecutive rounds of 69, he was never really in contention at the top of the leaderboard.
After missing the cut at the Players Championship and Masters, McIlroy took time off to refocus but was unable to hit the heights that he so often does.
It was another frustrating week for the four-time major winner who never found any form at the Oak Hill club he is an honorary member of, but he managed to keep in the trophy chase through sheer grit and determination.
Speaking to RTÉ Sport afterwards, he said: "I took a few good steps and there was some disappointment in there as well.
"At the end of the day, I just need to be better. I need to clean it up.
"I got off to the perfect start today and then I dump a wedge into the bunker right of the green on 2 where you can't miss it and make bogey.
"I just feel even when I do the right things, I'm sort of taking one step forward and then right at the next hole I'm taking one step back. So I need to sort of try to iron that out of my game a little bit.
"I think the finish maybe glosses over some of the cracks in my game. You can look at finishing seventh and think you had a good week but then when you dig into it, it wasn't - it maybe makes the week look a little better than it was.
"I need to work on things and I'm nowhere near as close as I want to be in my game in terms where I think my abilities are and it's just a matter of trying to, you know, get it right and work harder and just try to be better."
It was a similar story for Shane Lowry.
The Offaly man finished two shots behind McIlroy for a share of 12th place after a tournament that had higher highs and lower lows than his compatriot.
Lowry looked like he might be in a fight to make the cut after a first round of 73 but he followed that up with a brilliant round of 67 on Friday.
He was unable to build on that over the weekend and Saturday's round of 71 realistically ended his hopes of troubling the leaders.
Lowry played some good golf in Sunday’s final round yet was unable to take many of the opportunities he created for himself and admitted afterwards that he felt he left too many shots out on the golf course.
Speaking to RTÉ Sport, he said: "I played pretty good today, gave myself a lot of chances, gave myself a chance to kind of do something, but it never really got going, you know?
"It's another week at a major where I'm out there and I feel like I brought a lot of my best stuff with me so I'm pretty happy with my performance.
"It's easy I suppose to lose a bit of confidence from not having great finishes and by great finish I mean coming here and finishing on the podium or in the top five, but I'm very close to doing something.
"I'm out there every day and I'm probably not getting the best score possible everyday, but I'm still out there playing and competing at the top of this leaderboard.
"That's quite nice and I’m going into week off now and then a good stretch in the summer with another couple of majors coming up. I feel great."
