‘You’re always right’: Sergio Garcia scolds officials in failed Open qualifying attempt
Sergio Garcia puts his hands on his hat at West Lancashire.

Sergio Garcia will not be at the Open Championship for the second consecutive year.

Jan Kruger/R&A/R&A via Getty Images

After just slipping into the field at the U.S. Open last month, Sergio Garcia will not be as fortunate for the Open Championship later this month at Royal Troon.

Garcia played Open Championship Final Qualifying for the second year in a row. After coming up short last year, the LIV Golf star again missed on Tuesday at West Lancashire Golf Club, posting a 71-70 for a 36-hole total of three under to miss nabbing one of four available spots by two strokes.

The 2017 Masters champion’s day was marred by an episode during his first round after his group was one of several warned for slow play. Bunkered’s Ben Parsons reported that Garcia, by far the biggest name in the field of 72 hopefuls, had the largest crowds of the day and had to wait on “most tees” for fans to move off of his playing line.

Parsons captured video of Garcia having a testy exchange with two R&A officials in the 8th fairway during his first round.

Sergio Garcia furious at his slow play warning at Final Open Qualifying – saying fans are causing the delays. Here he is taking his anger out at two R&A officials.

“You’re right, we’re always wrong.” pic.twitter.com/hO2mzYgSRa

— Ben Parsons (@_benparsons) July 2, 2024
With strong winds at West Lancs Tuesday, it’s tough to make out exactly what Garcia is yelling, but the conversation ends with some blunt sarcasm from the European Ryder Cup legend.

“You’re right, we’re always wrong,” Garcia shouted.

Parsons tweeted that Garcia was upset because it was taking marshals “3-4 minutes” to move people out of Garcia’s way for each shot and thus he was unable to maintain a normal pace.

Garcia even needed to navigate through spectators in the middle of the fairway to get to the 18th green during his first round.

Nothing quite like Final Qualifying for @TheOpen.

Garcia walking through the fans before his birdie at the last to finish his first 18 one under. Big crowds here @WestLancsGC now. pic.twitter.com/5ETlgt3imf

— Ben Parsons (@_benparsons) July 2, 2024
Garcia elaborated on his frustrations after the round.

“It’s very simple,” he told bunkered. “When you have 2,000 people following us with no ropes, nothing.

“The marshals were trying to do the best job they could do but obviously we had to stop pretty much on every tee for two to three minutes to hit our tee shots because people were walking in front of the tee and on the fairway.

“Unless we wanted to start hitting people we couldn’t hit. I don’t think they took that into account and that was unfortunate. It made us rush. On a day like today when the conditions are so tricky and you might need a little of bit of extra time here and there it doesn’t help out. Because of that I made a couple of bogeys that might cost me getting to Troon.”