It's rather harsh to be taking potshots at Tiger Woods by pointing out how low he is in the world rankings but for the sake of comparison, it certainly serves a purpose. At 32, Cork golfer Niall Turner is not exactly a youngster eager to make his mark on the European tour.
However, given the amount of time he's spent away from the game through injury, it's easy to put him in that category. There's not many fair-weather golf fans who would have heard too much about Turner but, as pointed out by the Irish Times' golf correspondent Philip Reid, he's just after joining Paul Dunne in moving ahead of the likes of Woods and Edoardo Molinari in the world rankings.
Red letter day?? @NiallTurnerGolf and @dunners11 are now ranked ahead of Tiger in world rankings. #newkidsontheblock
— Philip Reid (@philreidgolf) February 1, 2016
While Dunne has gone about that rise in the more high profile manner of storming to the top of the Open leaderboard and getting an invite onto the PGA Tour, Turner, who's now up to 410 in the rankings has taken a more scenic route.
Having plugged away on the Challenge tour, Turner's progress was hampered by three separate career threatening injuries. However, he recovered from each of them and is now making waves on the Asian Tour. (Continued below)
Turner's most recent finish saw him finish joint 23rd in the SMBC Singapore Open, a tournament which world number one Jordan Spieth narrowly missed out on. He may still have some way to go to break into the upper echelons of the rankings but with Turner's former amateur rival Shane Lowry showing just what's possible, we certainly won't be betting against the Cork golfer continuing to make a name for himself at the top of the game.
