Prodigy Fisher finally breaks through

When you become the youngest ever to do something there is no hiding place and no escaping the fact that expectations go through the roof.

Oliver Fisher was one month and 10 days younger than previous record holder Justin Rose when he made his Walker Cup debut for Britain and Ireland at the age of 16 in 2005.
The following season he finished fifth at the European Tour qualifying school, thus becoming the youngest ever British player to earn a card.
So with no less an authority than Sir Nick Faldo labelling him a star of the future - Fisher won no fewer than five Faldo Junior Series titles - big things were expected.
But, as with Rose, it has not proved easy and one can only imagine the relief he felt when the winning putt dropped at the Czech Open on Sunday.
"It just shows what the game of golf can do - how bad it can be and how great it can be," said the 22-year-old from Essex.
While Rose missed his first 21 halfway cuts as a professional - straight after his fourth place finish in the 1998 Open when still an amateur - it all started so well for Fisher.
He picked up money in his first five starts, including 11th spot at the Qatar Masters. Lee Westwood, Sergio Garcia, Paul Casey and Darren Clarke were among the players he beat there.
Fisher's first top 10 came later that season and in May 2008, still only 19, he stood on the final tee of the Andalucian Open with a one-shot lead.
His drive was straight enough, but downwind it went far further than he planned - into water. He bogeyed the hole, lost the play-off to Thomas Levet and come the end of the following year found himself back at the qualifying school.
And not just back at it, but failing at it.
Others have crumbled from such a setback. Fisher, though, rebounded to take 81st place on the money list last season and in Madeira was only a single stroke away from another play-off.
But finishing the year with three missed cuts was a sign of more troubles to come. In his first 19 starts this season he crashed out early 18 times and looked to be at a real crisis point.
Hard work was the only way out and after making the cuts in Sweden and Ireland he came back from a two-week lay-off to set up another chance of victory this weekend.
Just as his career has so far been a rollercoaster ride, so was his final round.
From three in front he fell one behind Mikael Lundberg, but then sank 25-footers on the 16th and 17th and, with the Swede three-putting the 17th, triumphed by two.
From 224th on the "Race to Dubai" standings Fisher has leapt to 75th and from 507th in the world he has jumped to 238th.
It will be fascinating to follow his fortunes now he has broken through and, as he put it himself, now that he has "proven myself".
Scotland's Steven O'Hara was joint leader with Fisher with a round to go and he too hoped it would end with his first Tour victory.
The 31-year-old was a team-mate of Luke Donald and Graeme McDowell at the 2001 Walker Cup, but in over 200 starts since then has had only two top-three finishes and has had to return to the qualifying school four times.
O'Hara was still in the hunt with three to play, but four-putted the 16th for a bogey six, went out of bounds on the short 17th and, after chipping in there to salvage a bogey, three-putted the last to drop another stroke.
They were costly errors. By finishing only tied fifth he moved up a mere 14 places on the money list to 129th. Only the top 115 at the end of the season keep their cards.
Hope clearly springs eternal in the mind of Padraig Harrington.
"If I have four good weeks I could win the FedEx Cup and have a great year," said the Dubliner.
"That's what the play-offs are about," Harrington said. "It gives everybody who gets into them an opportunity."
This after Harrington came 47th in the Wyndham Championship, good enough to take him from 130th to 124th on the cup points list, with 125 going through.Unlike Tiger Woods, who chose not to play after missing the cut in the USPGA, Harrington dropped plans for a holiday in the Bahamas to go to North Carolina instead.
"I never like to do things easy," he commented after his closing 68.
It will take an astonishing turnaround in form - he has not won in America or Europe since the 2008 USPGA - for Harrington even to make it all the way through the series, however.
Only the top 100 advance to the second leg, then the top 70 to the third leg and just 30 to the deciding Tour Championship in Atlanta on September 22-25.
Paul Casey joined Woods in missing out on the whole thing and that makes him available for the Vivendi Seve Trophy in Paris on September 15-18.
Having not returned to Europe at the end of the Ryder Cup qualifying race last year and then not being given a wild card, playing for Paul McGinley's Britain and Ireland side could be a useful exercise with next year's match in Chicago in mind.