Tiger and Darren discover the joy of text

Darren Clarke and the Claret Jug. Pic: Phil Inglis/www.golffile.ieTiger Woods and Darren Clarke spent a few minutes chatting on the phone in the early hours of Monday morning.

And for Clarke it must have been a relief from trying to read the string of text messages he’d been sent by the former world No 1.

Close friends long before Clarke hammered Woods in the final of the Accenture Match Play final at La Costa in 2000, the content of their exchanges is a mystery.

However, Clarke’s manager Chubby Chandler revealed that Woods had sent more than just one or two messages.

After Clarke beat him in 2000, Tiger left a note in the Ulsterman’s locker: “Well done … Enjoy it you fat f**k.”

This time Woods appears to have given Clarke a running commentary on the final round of the Open - while Clarke was still playing.

His agent Chubby Chandler revealed: “They were talking for a couple of minutes. They were swapping texts. When Darren turned his phone on he had six or seven texts from Tiger when he was out on the course. It was almost like Tiger was commentating on what he was doing.”

Woods is believed to have given Clarke more than just a couple of pointers on how to close the deal. Whether he could read them after the night-long celebrations that ended just 30 minutes before his Monday morning press conference appearas unlikely.

“I have 294 messages, and the writing is far too small for me to look at them in this state,” a bleary-eyed Clarke said. “So I may look at them tomorrow at some stage and figure them out.”