McIlroy set to return to World No.1 following AT&T

Four-time major winner, Rory McIlroy, is set to return to World No.1 next week as the two-year rolling format of the Official World Golf Rankings ticks over on Monday 10th February.

It will mark the Northern Irishman’s first time at the top of the golfing world since the 2015 US Open.

Rory McIlroy won his third major title at the 2014 Open Championship (Credit: Matt Harris)

With Brooks Koepka and World No. 3 Jon Rahm not playing at this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the door was left wide open for the 30-year-old to make up the 0.2 points needed to leapfrog Koepka, who has held the top spot for 38 weeks and a total of 47 weeks overall.

“I think it’s always cool when you attain that ranking…whether it’s the first time ever or the first time in a while.,” said McIlroy in a recent interview with USA Today.

“If I go about my business and I try to do the right things all the time, if I play well enough for a sustained period of time, hopefully I get there.”

McIlroy currently sits fourth on the list of all-time number of weeks at World No.1 and will move to within one week of Sir Nick Faldo (97 weeks). Although to be fair, Faldo’s first decade on Tour didn’t count towards the rankings, which were not implemented until 1986.

Once McIlroy passes Sir Nick the job gets a lot harder though with Greg Norman sitting at No. 2 with 331 weeks and of course Tiger Woods almost double that figure at 683 weeks.