Ah, the perks of the job. It wasn’t that long ago that Liam Johnston was driving around in the kind of jalopy you’d find in Steptoe’s yard. Things change when you become a European Tour player, though.
“I’ve just started a partnership with a BMW dealer,” reported the 25-year-old from Dumfries. “My car before had one wing mirror duck-taped on and a massive scrape down the side … but it wasn’t caused by me.”
Johnston has certainly got motoring since turning professional just over a year ago. A victory on the third-tier Pro Golf Tour in February was a good
start to his year. A victory on the Challenge Tour in just his third start on the circuit in May was even better.
When he won again in Kazakhstan to seal his promotion to the European Tour in double-quick time, those BMW engineers must have been tempted to ask him for advice on improving acceleration. It’s been a sporting life in the fast lane over the last few months and it continues tomorrow when Johnston starts his 2019 campaign in the Honma Hong Kong Open.
“I think it will really sink in when I play in events that I used to watch on the TV,” he added. “I’ll realise then ‘geez, we’re on the tour now’.”
Johnston will be the first to admit that he is hardly Mr Consistency. After his first Challenge Tour win he missed eight of his next 11 cuts before winning again.
“If I’m on my game, I’m on but if I’m off it I will miss the cut,” he said. “I don’t know what you’d rather be. People have asked me that question. Would you rather have a lot of top-10s or a couple of wins? I’d prefer the way it is, to have wins. But consistency will be important on the tour. I need to make my bad stuff better.”
Delaying the transition to the pro game was a wise move. Johnston had wanted to make the leap before 2017 but, cannily steered by his coach James Erskine, he stayed put and got a couple of significant wins under his belt.
“Without James, I wouldn’t be where I am,” he said. “I came back from college in the US thinking I wasn’t good enough to play pro golf. He said ‘you’ve not learned to win at an amateur level yet’. The last time I’d won was the Tennant Cup in 2012 but then I won two in 2017. Those wins stood me in good stead. When I got into a position to
win as a pro I didn’t fear the situation.”
Bumping into the manager of the football club he supports was also a situation Johnston took in his stride. “It was a red-eye flight and Brendan Rodgers wanted to sleep and I had a lot of questions obviously,” said Johnston with a smile as he recalled a flight in
the company of the bleary-eyed Celtic manager.
“It was just after a 6-0 win Celtic had that got their season going and it was interesting hearing him talking about what he’d said to his players about desire and will.”
Johnston has demonstrated plenty of that this year.
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