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Both at their best, McIlroy now too good for Tiger

Tiger's win at the Chevron was thrilling © Getty Images

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• Profile: Rory McIlroy | Tiger Woods

2011 left it late to deliver one of the most important weeks of the year for golf, as Rory McIlroy, Lee Westwood and Tiger Woods all won at significant events around the globe.

No prizes for guessing which of those wins garnered the most headlines.

It was a thrill for almost every casual observer to see Woods back in the hunt at a significant PGA Tour event, even if the field at the Chevron World Challenge was only 18-strong. And the manner of his victory was vintage Tiger - holing two putts from around 10 feet to finish birdie-birdie and edge former Masters champion Zach Johnson in a one-shot triumph.

If the trademark fist-pump Woods unleashed after his victory didn't underline his delight, then the tweet he subsequently sent out to his 1.5 million Twitter followers surely did.

While Westwood's win at the even smaller (but perhaps more lucrative) Nedbank Golf Challenge was something of a formality after taking a seven-shot lead into the final day, McIlroy had to perform late heroics of his own in order to claim victory at the Hong Kong Open, holing out from a greenside bunker to triumph after coming down the final hole in a share of the lead.

McIlroy didn't play to his peak, but he managed to pluck something special out of the ether when he needed it most in order to grind out a win. Remind you of anyone?

"To be able to win golf tournaments when you're not playing your best is what the likes of Tiger did week in, week out whenever he was winning seven, eight, nine tournaments a year, and that's something if you want to be a great player," the Northern Irishman acknowledged. "You're going to have to be able to do that."

On the surface the manner of both Woods and McIlroy's weekend wins was remarkably similar, but the reality was subtly different. McIlroy - suffering the effects of both excessive travel in recent weeks and a virus that has left him low on energy - beat a reasonably strong European Tour field while under the weather and not at his best.

Woods, in contrast, was playing against just 17 exhausted PGA Tour players while he remained fairly fresh after a stop-start year - and only he may know how close to the best he is now capable of was the level of golf he produced over four days at Sherwood Country Club.

"Some tournaments are easier than others [to win] because of how I'm playing," Woods offered after his first success in two years - or 749 days. "Some tournaments where I'm not playing well and somehow I've been able to scrap and scrounge every single stroke out of it how and [been] able to wind up on top. Other tournaments I really play well and I'll separate."

That answer suggests Woods doesn't just believe that he didn't play his best in Southern California (something almost every golfer feels every time they play, regardless of the final score), but that he still has another level he can still find. Certainly that was true in the past, but it is harder to be confident that it is still the case now. After all, we haven't seen it for a while.

Meanwhile, McIlroy's win at Congressional in the US Open - an event an injured Woods missed - was so dominant that it could only be compared to the great major wins of Woods' past - most obviously the 1997 Masters but perhaps, to a lesser extent, the 2000 US Open too. That's the plane McIlroy has shown he is capable of attaining - a plane Woods arguably hasn't been on since winning the BMW Championship at Cog Hill in 2009, long before either his personal life or his left knee fell apart.

Rory McIlroy was a dramatic victor in Hong Kong © Getty Images

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Woods still shows the scars of both disasters - formerly in the way he interacts with the press and fans (colder with the one, a sort of forced-friendly with the other) and latterly in the faintly-ridiculous form-fit shoes he wears on the course and the way his lower body has been 'quietened' in his golf swing.

That is what leaves lingering concerns about his ability to return to his former level. Woods' professional career has arguably been one long and often arduous transition from naturally-talented phenomenon (1997) to robotic, mechanically-precise swing automaton (2011). The turn of the millennium, where he won the 'Tiger Slam' was arguably where he found the perfect balance between the two.

Now he is heading further and further in one direction - the natural talent is still there, but it is consigned to a secondary role behind countless swing thoughts and set positions.

"A couple of times out there I hit a couple of loose shots, and that's because my backswing wasn't where I need to have it - and I know it," Woods said. "But under the gun I kind of got back into an old pattern, so obviously I need more reps and create a new pattern."

Can Woods get his backswing in the right place on a more consistent basis? Of course he can. But will it be as lethal as it once was, as capable of free-wheeling magic and ridiculously low scoring? That seems less clear-cut, and that's perhaps why McIlroy holds a distinct advantage.

It's worth noting, however, that technical quality was always only half of the equation when Woods was at the top of the game - at the top of sport, even - and he harked back to it during the denouement on Sunday, admittedly over two of the easier closing holes in tournament golf.

"When the pressure was on the most the last two holes, I hit three of the best shots I hit all week," Woods noted. "That's very exciting for me."

That's the skill that evidently hasn't left Tiger, the same one that has perhaps played a bigger role than any in his progression to 14 major titles. Woods, quite simply, knows how to triumph - and has the innate ability to raise his game under the gun.

It's a unstoppable will to win that so few sportsman have to the same extent, a refusal to be denied that amazes those that witness it.

McIlroy has still to show that same quality in the biggest events of all - but he's hinted at it in the manner of his two most recent victories, in Hong Kong and previously at the Shanghai Masters.

Experience and sheer will to win appear to be in Tiger's corner. But unencumbered talent and ability might well be in McIlroy's.

2012 might well reveal who has the upper hand over four rounds on a consistent basis but, best against best, it is tempting to suggest that McIlroy is currently capable of a level that Woods will never be able to find again.

"If I was to come up against Tiger on a Sunday it would be something to look forward to," the young upstart told The Guardian this week.

"Not many players of my generation have experienced it yet, and it would be great to have the opportunity to do it.

"It looks like next year really could be something, with lots of players playing well. I'm just happy to be involved in it."

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