Lawrie slams Jeff Maggert

In a frank interview with Today's Golfer magazine, Open Champion Paul Lawrie broke from his quiet man image to speak out about last years Ryder Cup war at Brookline, carpeting Jeff Maggert for behaving "disgustingly".

Lawrie, who played Maggert two times at Brookline revealed his true feelings answering questions from readers who penned questions for the Open Champion in this months issue.

One reader asked Lawrie "How scary was the Ryder Cup?" and in a succinct reply, the 32-year-old Aberdonian replied:

"It was hell out there. Standing on the 1st tee there were 35,000 people yelling at you. I knew that 30,000 were baying for my blood. It's not what golf should be like.

"Some of the American players behaved disgustingly. One or two of them need to take a long hard look at themselves…Jeez, one was going up to the crowd and shaking his fists enticing them.

Lawrie stopped short of naming the player, but Paul Mahoney of TG deduced it could only be Lehman (most likely), Mickelson, Sutton or Woods.

Lawrie continued:
"The crowd were yelling at the top of your backswing. You expected it. I played against one guy twice, (Jeff Maggert) and he was not nice company. He was disgusting.

"The Ryder Cup is now not played the way Sam Ryder intended. I fear it will be a long time before it gets any better".

Lawrie also continued about how he felt for Colin Montgomerie and how even Sergio Garcia was a little over exuberant at times. Montgomerie's father James left the fairways one afternoon because he could not tolerate any more abuse directed at his son

"Some of the abuse Monty took was unbelievable" Said Lawrie. "I couldn't tell you some of the language. They were even calling him a Limey, which is daft! Sergio Garcia got a bit over excited too which was wrong but at least he is just young and just got a bit caught up in it".

And of the incident that ignited the fire at Brookline, the infamous putt on the 17th, Lawrie was dumbstruck when he saw the video in the team room after the event.

"It was bad enough that the players ran on to the green, but what the hell were all the wives doing there?

"The Ryder Cup was worse than anything you could imagine. I knew it would be different because Monty told me about it before we went but nothing could prepare you for how hostile it was".

Lawrie is in this weeks field at Ballybunion for the Irish Open which starts on Thursday, leading up to his defence of the Open Championship at St Andrews in mid July.