Rory McIlroy: Rob Lee says world No 1 should not be classed as great just yet

Rob Lee says we should hold fire on branding Rory McIlroy a great and looks at the contenders for this week's DP World Tour Championship...

Rory McIlroy has done things that the greats haven’t and certainly has greatness within him – but I don’t think we should call him a great just yet.

Can you be a great, especially in the golfing world, at 26? I’m not sure you can.

If Rory – who, last week, secured the Race to Dubai for the second time in his career – collects the Masters Green Jacket in April, he will have completed the Major Grand Slam at the age of 26.

Perhaps then people will be able to roll out the ‘G’ word but that would be too early in my view as I don’t think you can weigh up someone’s greatness until much later on in their career.

Can you be a great, especially in the golfing world, at 26? I’m not sure you can. So let's wait and see how McIlroy develops.

Rory has had a great season, though, with his two Major wins – The Open Championship and the USPGA Championship – victories at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational and BMW PGA Championship, and getting back to, and staying at, World No 1 the highlights.

That said, I don’t know how McIlroy will perform this week in the DP World Tour Championship after having a lot of time off to concentrate on this court case with his former management company.

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I don't doubt his ability to flourish on the course while the flak is flying off it, but we don’t know how much time he has been able to spend practicing and whether a lot of legal stuff has prevented him from applying himself.

One of the key reasons for Rory’s success this year has been the amount of time he has had to work on his game, something that has helped him execute properly in tournament play, but if his mind has been diverted by this case, then he could be a bit rusty in Dubai.

That’s the question mark but if McIlroy has had enough prep time, he is the big favourite to win this season-ending event.

Pyrotechnics

There are plenty of other contenders, however.

The Dubai course is one that favours the big hitters as there is plenty of space on which to land your ball and because the greens are interesting, the shorter club you wield into them the better.

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Henrik Stenson won there last year, while Lee Westwood was champion in 2009, so look out for those two, as well as Alexander Levy and last week’s Turkish Airlines Open victor Brooks Koepka.

Stenson hasn’t produced the pyrotechnics of 2013, when he won the Race to Dubai and the FedEx Cup, but there’s every chance he finishes second to Rory on the European Tour Order of Merit.

Henrik also had an excellent Ryder Cup and top-five finishes at the US Open and the USPGA, while he made the final of the Volvo World Match Play Championship, so that’s not too shabby!

You can’t wipe the floor with the opposition twice – those years come around once in a lifetime – so he has done well to back up his success and after some nice rounds recently, I think he will do okay in Dubai.

Levy, meanwhile, is another booming hitter of a golf ball and he has confidence in droves after winning in Portugal and coming close to winning in China.

I really like his get-up-and-go mentality – there’s no messing about and whenever he makes a decision it’s a definite one – and if he gets hot around this course, watch out!

ROB’S SKY BET TIPS

Stenson is desperate to defend the DP World Tour Championship and his closing 64 in Turkey shows you what sort of fettle he is in. I’d also back Levy to end the year with a bang and the wily and in-form Westwood to make his mark.