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Johannesburg - The all-time leading major winner in golf, Jack Nicklaus, believes South African Ernie Els' bad run of form recently belies his natural talent and the 41 year old can still be a top competitor for the next five years.
"Ernie lives at my golf course in Florida, and he's there all the time and Ben is in school there," said the 18 time major champion.
"I see him a lot and I mean he missed the cut again at the PGA yesterday (Friday) and he just has too much talent to be where he is right now." Nicklaus was speaking at Houghton golf club on Saturday where he had a final look at the changes he made to the course in a redesign he did on the testing layout.
Heralded as the 'greatest golfer ever' and with his record in majors championships unmatched, the 71-year-old arrived at the course in a helicopter to be greeted by over a hundred fans and members.
Nicklaus made mention of the battles the 'Big Easy' has had with his putting, as he ranks 192nd on the PGA tour this year in putts from the crucial five to ten feet range.
"I'm not sure what's going on with Ernie, he's still got a great golf swing. "He's just not putting very well, he's not been making very many putts," said Nicklaus.
The 'Golden Bear' also questioned Els' motivation for the game at the moment.
"I don't know where his motivation is right now, and it seems to me that Ernie being about 41 right now, he has the opportunity to be a really good player for another five or six years.
" The real problem with Els, is that while his ball striking is as good as the best in the world, still he is unable to put together four good rounds and it usually comes back to his poor putting at the root of the matter.
"Els is dealing with his young son Ben, born in 2002, who is autistic and is one of the reasons Els cannot solely focus on his golf.
"He's been through a tough time with Ben, he's spent a lot of time with his son since they found out he had autism. I'm not sure if he's spending more time there than on his golf game, but there's something going on with Ernie that I don't know," said Nicklaus.
Nicklaus also made mention of Els' veteran compatriot Retief Goosen but said he did not have quite the same insight into his game.
"Retief, honestly, I'm not sure what's going on with him because I haven't heard him talk. Retief's a great guy, but he doesn't use a lot of extra words," he said.
Speaking about the new generation of young South African golfers, Nicklaus was positive about the future for local players.
"You've got an absolute ton of good South African golfers. It's amazing with a country of the population you have can produce so many top athletes and particularly golfers. (Charl )Schwartzel and (Louis) Ooosthuizen aren't actually that young, and I'm sure you've got a whole bunch of guys I don't even know about," he explained.
"And every year you keep popping up on leaderboards with more good players, so the talent in this country is great."
