It would be fair to say that Rory McIlroy has struggled in 2017 as injury and problems on the putting surface have seen him fail to land a worldwide title for the first time since 2008.
For the mere mortal, a record of six top-10 finishes would be considered an excellent return but McIlroy has a talent that most can only dream of and he demands much more of himself.
Expectations have been high ever since the Northern Irishman bounced back from the heartache of blowing a four-shot final-round lead at the 2011 Masters to win the US Open by eight shots just a couple of months later.
He doubled his major tally at the 2012 US PGA Championship before enjoying the best period of his career in 2014 – winning the Open, the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational and the US PGA Championship in succession.
However, that remains the last time that he tasted success in a major and, to a certain extent, the Ryder Cup ace has been a victim of his own success, as fans expect him to win pretty much everything.
The golfing landscape has changed over the past four or five years, with youngsters such as Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas and John Rahm now emerging as McIlroy’s equal, while Dustin Johnson has become the world’s best player and seems to challenge for honours nearly every time he tees it up.
McIlroy can hold his own against anyone in the world when on the top of his game and there are still plenty of pundits who feel he is the man to beat when all things are equal but, such is the class on show these days, he can no longer win tournaments unless playing at his very best.
The man from County Down does have two top-10s in the 2017 majors but he has never really threatened to win one and his form over the latter stage of the PGA Tour campaign has been nothing to write home about. This has left some critics questioning whether he can win a major this year.
While Spieth has won three majors by sinking anything in range, McIlroy’s flat stick has been his Achilles heel and a couple of grip changes during the season prove that he is not comfortable.
He can still mix it with the bombers off the tee and his driving accuracy has been superb for lengthy parts of the season, but he has just not been able to put it all together over four rounds.
This has happened before as the 2016 FedEx Cup champion suffered a dip in 2013 before hitting back the following year to reach the top of the rankings.
Having sorted out his personal life back then, McIlroy then went on an incredible run and the hope is, now he is a kept man, the same might happen in 2018.
Like another British sporting icon, Andy Murray, it is clear that the Holywood-born star has not been fully fit this year and trying to compete with the new breed of Americans has proved tough.
But nobody should be writing him off just yet and, after a decent period of rest over the winter, it would surprise nobody to see the world number six back to his best in 2018.
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He is capable of winning many more majors but would probably settle for any success just to prove that there is still plenty left in the tank.
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