New Open Champion Louis Oosthuizen had further reason to celebrate with the news that his victory at St Andrews had elevated him to a career high of 15 on the Official World Golf Ranking.
Before the start of the week, the 27 year old South African was outside the top 50 in 54th place but his sensational seven shot triumph at the Home of Golf changed all that.
Oosthuizen became the fourth South African golfer to win The Open Championship, following in the footsteps of Bobby Locke, Gary Player and Ernie Els and he revealed that Player had called him on Sunday morning just before he set off for the course.
“He (Gary) phoned me this morning. We had a little chat. It was nice. He spoke in my home language, Afrikaans. He first spoke to my wife, and then he was saying just to stay calm out there, have a lot of fun, and he said that the crowd was probably going to be on Paul's side.
“But then he told me the story when he played against Arnold Palmer when he won his first Masters. He said, they wanted to throw stuff at me! (laughter). But he was so focused on beating him in Augusta. So you know, it meant a lot, him phoning me up. Yeah, he's just a great guy.”
