BRITISH MASTERS: Peterborough's Tiger makes professional debut

The Milton member already has the same middle name as one golfing great and tomorrow he will emulate another. At 16 years and one week old, the boy from Peterborough will be the same age as Rory McIlroy when he made his debut in a professional tournament – and it will be in the same event as well.

The British Masters has extended one of its invitations to Williams, the top-ranked junior in Europe.

The invite comes on the back of a superb 2017 for Williams - a year in which he was a semi-finalist in the Boys’ Amateur Championship, third in the English Under 16 Open and fifth in the Under 18 Open. He also represented Great Britain against Europe in the Jacques Leglise Trophy.

But Tiger was making headlines back in 2012 when at the age of 11 and a pupil at Hampton Hargate School, he became the youngest-ever winner of a Future World Champions’ event in America.

Sky Sports heard about it and ran a promotional video on him.

And Sky Sports, who have done so much to resurrect the British Masters, certainly believe in him, having invited him into the tournament’s Pro-Am for the last two years. The pros were impressed and raved about the youngster to the organisers.

Williams will be playing the first two rounds with proven Tour pros Lee Slattery and Jorge Campillo and dad Morne is fulfilling the caddie duties.

“Can you imagine?” Morne said. “We will be a few groups ahead of Rory, the crowds and the noise will be huge. I’ll definitely be more nervous than Robin, because, I’m telling you, he will not be intimidated.

“It’s funny, because when he was eight I had a little Claret Jug made with his name engraved on it as ‘Open Champion, 2020’.

“Back then he would say he would win that particular Open over and over and it’s still there on the mantelpiece, acting as motivation. Just to play in that major would be amazing and I always tell him: ‘If you dream it, you can believe it.’

“We are blessed to be in Britain and to have these opportunities and the help from Sky and England Golf has been fantastic. This is an incredible dream and you just to have run at it. Who knows where it will end, but I wouldn’t put anything beyond him. I notice he is 1,000-1 with one bookie ...”