Remember when amateur golfer Justin Rose tied for fourth at the Open Championship in 1998 at the tender age of 17? Ah, what promise he showed, what potential, what hopes we had for the next great English golfer (if you ignore the fact he was born in South Africa that is).

Rose turned professional a week after his remarkable Open achievement and promptly missed 21 cuts in a row, dropping out of the pubic eye as he struggled to get to grips with the professional side of golf. He won his first tournament in 2002, the Dunhill Championship in, ironically, South Africa and established himself on the European tour.

It looked as though he was going to have a comfortable, fairly successful but not brilliant career. Another Englishman failing to fulfil his early potential.

Skip forward to present day. Rose is now 29 and, having switched to the PGA Tour from the European Tour, has recently won his first tournament in the US, the Memorial Tournament. He carded a final round 66 to win by three strokes.

His form is continuing to improve and at the end of the second day at the Travelers Championship Rose leads by four shots after two highly impressive rounds of 64 and a brilliant 62 yesterday, recording five birdies on the back nine at River Highlands Club in Conneticut.

One tournament, or even two, does not make a career but it does look like Rose’s growing maturity is allowing his golfing gifts to come to the fore (pardon the pun). Should he qualify for the Open Championship at St Andrews we’ll see if he has grown into the golfer we all thought he could become.

Fingers crossed, because I like Rose and would like to see him win at least one Major in his career. That fourth place way back in 1998 was enough for me to want that.