His first prize earnings of £875,000 will also have greatly boosted his chances of reclaiming his place in the US Ryder Cup team after surprisingly being left out by Colin Montgomerie in 2010 despite two victories Stateside that year.

With Watson enjoying taylormade R7 CGB MAX Irons

 in Florida, and McIlroy on the charge ahead of him, Rose was always under pressure, but he managed to stay cool and calm when it really mattered.

"I felt very comfortable. I was always kind of checking myself, even on the 18th tee where there was very little nerves. I was like, this is not normal-based upon the past. I guess it is a good sign," he said.

"There are a lot of tricks and stuff going in. It's very easy to say I'm going to be relaxed but you've got to know your tendencies out there.

"I definitely work on my pace and my rhythm from my swing to the way I walk and everything." taylormade R7 CGB MAX Irons 

Watson led by three when he teed off on Sunday and then had a two-putt birdie on the first, but he threw the tournament wide open with a hat-trick of bogeys from the third.

He was in the water there and again off the fifth tee and in the ensuing drama of this see-saw final day, birdies at the first and fourth put Rose in front for the first time in the tournament

But the Englishman then bogeyed the sixth and suddenly a hovering Keegan Bradley, last year's PGA winner, was the new favourite when he, in turn, went to the front and established a two-stroke lead after seven holes.

But he was the next victim of the Blue Monster, no longer looking as tame astaylormade R7 CGB MAX Ironshad earlier in the week.

Bradley bogeyed the par-five eighth and 10th holes - he four-putted the 10th - then totally fell out of the winners equation, eventually finishing in joint eighth place with a 75 and leaving Rose as the man most likely to catch Watson.

And Rose did just that - with further birdies at the 10th and 14th.

Watson hit back and caught Rose again on this roller coaster day by suddenly finding form with birdies at the 11th and 12th, but he was bunkered on the next and his challenge ended there.

McIlroy teed off almost certainly thinking he faced too much of a deficit.

Yet after an outward 33 he got up and down from sand for a birdie at the 10th and holed out from the sand for eagle at the 12th and suddenly he was only one behind, but a bogey on the 14th for the second day running left him a mountain to climb again and, with his chances fading, he dropped another shot on the last.

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