Many golfers on the leaderboard at the Open have been taking a performance-enhancing drug through the eyeballs. Without risk of offending Gary Player, they have had their nerves steadied and their competitive drive boosted by the sight of Tiger Woods in trouble so serious that he set out on his third round over the Carnoustie links with bookmakers’ odds of 7-1 attached to his name.

That price was more than double the best available on Thursday morning and it was clear, mathematical recognition of how much damage had already been done to Woods’s chances of becoming the first man since Australia’s Peter Thomson in the mid-1950s to win the Open three years in a row. When Woods almost immediately dropped another shot on Saturday afternoon (putting him two above par and eight behind the leader, Sergio Garcia, before the Spaniard had teed off) it appeared that even the habitual miracle-worker would be obliged to accept that contriving a significant challenge was a less realistic goal than finding a respectable position among the also-rans.

But the bleak omens were misleading. His swing had regained much of the rhythm and conviction that it had in the first round, showed none of the the lack of commitment that betrayed it expensively on Friday, and better scoring was just about inevitable. Soon, with birdies at the fourth, fifth and seventh holes, he was one under par and, although that progress was cancelled by a bogey on the tenth, optimism was rising anew among the multitude who back him with their money and their fervour.

Obviously, it’s the emotional stake that counts with those of us who have to come to feel that at his peak, whether he is dominating in imperious isolation or holding rivals at bay by deploying technical superiority with the canniness of an accountant, he brings an irreplaceable drama to the climactic stages of the biggest golfing occasions, ensuring a palpable sense of loss when he is back in the chasing pack. No doubt he was a little too dramatic yesterday for the unfortunate female spectator whose skull contributed a friendly ricochet for his second shot at the sixth hole. Whether or not the bounce did him much good, it was definitely no bargain for the poor woman, who required treatment for a head gash. Unless she has a profound allegiance to his cause, her appreciation of the coolness with which he went on to shoot that birdie at the seventh may have been less than wholehearted.

His travails at Carnoustie can be no shock for Tiger. This season he has been a king in exile from his natural ruling role at the major championships. Finishing in ties for second place at the Masters and the US Open was rendered additionally painful in both cases by the experience of losing after having held the lead during the final round, something that had never previously happened to him in a major. In spite of his commendable attempt to resurrect prospects of the Open hat-trick with a third round of 69 (leaving his aggregate one under par), there was no reason last night for the bookies to regret their policy of drawing punters to his banner. Can even the genius himself believe he will charge from so far back at Carnoustie to add to the total of 12 major titles he reached in 2006?

If, as looks probable, the feat is beyond him, the focus of my hopes switches but remains, I must confess, a touch elitist.

In the absence of the king, my desire is that a worthy regent will emerge, preferably from the gifted but largely frustrated group who have been considered at various times capable of producing, if not a convincing challenge to Woods’s long-term hegemony, at least surges of excellence sufficiently remarkable and sustained to deny him a comfortable reign and perhaps usurp his position for a while.

Vijay Singh did all of that with the 2004-5 run of extraordinary successes that gave him a spell in possession of the world No1 ranking, splendidly interrupting the virtual monopoly of that distinction Woods has maintained over the past decade. Singh also has an impressive majors record (three victories) and that can be said, too, of three of the other men who once harboured ambitions of being consistent rivals to Woods: Ernie Els (three majors wins), Phil Mickelson (three) and Retief Goosen (two).

Sadly, Mickelson added to his reputation for miserably underselling his talent on his rare expeditions outside the US by failing to make the cut this weekend but Goosen, Els and Singh will go on to the old links today with every right to think they are in contention for the championship.

Plainly, however, when last-day action begins here on the east coast of Scotland, centre-stage will be claimed by the youngest of those few golfers identified in recent years as having the ability to steal the applause, and maybe a clutch of the most coveted prizes, away from Tiger. His youth alone would make 27-year-old Sergio Garcia a marvellously welcome Open champion (since Ben Curtis had a birthday in May, there is no winner of a major who is still under 30) but there are better reasons for wanting him to succeed. The first is his own talent. It fluctuates but the best of it, from his superb driving to the wonders he can contrive around the green, entitles him to an inscription on the Claret Jug.

My second, unapologetically sentimental reason wishing Garcia well this afternoon is that a Spanish triumph would warm the heart of Seve Ballesteros — and Seve warmed ours often enough.