Rory McIlroy explains what drove him to Butch Harmon ahead of Masters

Rory McIlroy visited Butch Harmon after The Players Championship in an attempt to address his struggles over recent months.

McIlroy, 34, has finished outside the top 20 in all but one of his starts since a blistering beginning to the year in Dubai. After being agonisingly beaten by Tommy Fleetwood in the Dubai Invitational, the world number two defended his Dubai Desert Classic title the following week.

But since returning to the United States from the Middle East, that form deserted him, finishing 15 shots off the pace at Pebble Beach. Despite finally cracking the top 20 again at The Players last time out, McIlroy was well behind the eventual winner, world number one Scottie Scheffler.

After not playing the Houston Open or the Valspar Championship, McIlroy spent some time during the backend of last month working on his game with Harmon. “I’ve done this a number of times in my career,” he said at a press conference before his next scheduled start at the Texas Open.

“I met Butch when I was 14 years old, so we’ve always had a good relationship. If there’s one guy that I want to go and get a second opinion from, it’s him.

“After The Players and struggling through that Florida Swing with my swing and with some of the misses I was having with my irons, I just thought to myself, ‘I’m obviously missing something here.’

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Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland talks with Butch Harmon during a practice round prior to the 2016 PGA Championship

“‘And I would love to go and get a second opinion and have him take a look, a second set of eyes. The one thing with Butch is you spend time with him, and you’re always going to feel better about yourself at the end of it, whether you’re hitting it better or not.

“He’s half golf coach, half psychologist, in a way. It’s fun to go out there; I went and spent probably four hours with him in Vegas.”

Harmon is in Henderson, Nevada and runs the Butch Harmon School of Golf at Las Vegas ‘ Rio Secco Golf Club. The veteran instructor has 60 years of experience in the sport and has worked with a who’s who of golfing greats.

Ernie Els, Fred Couples, Greg Norman and Stewart Cink are among his former students. Current players Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson, Rickie Fowler and Tiger Woods have also had coaching from him.

And his words of wisdom did the trick for McIlroy. “He said a couple of things to me that resonated,” the Northern Irishman recalled. “It’s the same stuff that I’ve been trying to do with my coach, Michael (Bannon), but he sort of just said it in a different way that maybe hit home with me a little bit more.

“It was a really worthwhile trip, and I feel like I’ve done some good work after that. As I said, this is a good week to see where that work has gotten me.”