The start of Robert MacIntyre’s 2020 campaign has been put on hold after the Oban left-hander was forced to pull out of this week’s Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship with a niggling wrist injury.
MacIntyre, last season’s European Tour rookie of the year, has been nursing the problem since last summer but having taken six weeks off over the winter, the 23-year-old was feeling confident it had improved.
Speaking to The Herald from Dubai last week where he was tuning up for this week’s event, MacIntyre stated that it was the first time he had played pain free since The Open.
Really disappointed to have to pull out of this week’s @ADGolfChamps, but I need another week to get myself back to full fitness before launching my 2020 @EuropeanTour campaign. This is a great event, so it’s frustrating to miss out this year.
— Robert Macintyre (@robert1lefty) January 15, 2020
However, the ailment has returned to cause him some discomfort and prompted the Scottish No 1 to withdraw from the $7m Rolex Series event.
“Really disappointed but I need another week to get myself back to full fitness before launching my 2020 campaign,” he wrote on his social media page.
MacIntyre, a three-time runner-up on the tour during 2019, hopes to be fit for next week’s Dubai Desert Classic
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