On Monday, when I finished my first practice round at Royal Birkdale, I stood by the 18th green and looked around at the grandstands, the scoreboards and clubhouse and thought what a great spectacle the Open Championship is. I also thought: “It is time I put my game face on.”

I feel I have always played well when it matters, and it matters now. I feel I am good at dealing with pressure. Anyway, to a degree it is self-inflicted. I am here at the Open, I am happy with my golf and my world ranking of No 9. I am happy with where I am, but I have a lot to do this week.

I knew that one day of the Open I would be playing early and one day late and I wanted to get a feel of the course early, so I got up at 5.30am on Monday, got to the course by 6.15 and was on the 1st tee at 7.15. It was beautiful at that time and well worth getting up for, but I noticed one difference from the United States immediately. At that time in the US there would be people about — players, officials, marshals, greenstaff. There was next to no one there on Monday when I started, although I was pulling along a little crowd of spectators on the last few holes.

Thinking about the US Open and the last major championship I played in, I realise I made a mistake in my preparation. I went into it with a lot of confidence, having finished second in my previous event, so missing the cut was a shock. The trouble in San Diego was I concentrated too much on my long game and did not do enough work on my short game and in the end the putting found me out. I was hitting the ball well enough from tee to green, but I took 69 putts in my first two rounds.

So this week I have spent more time putting, an hour at least on both Monday and Tuesday and probably the same yesterday. It was a bit too windy to play. I was using a gadget on the putting green on Tuesday that consists of a piece of string running between two skewers. It is like a washing line six inches above the ground. I hit the ball out of a triangular flat plate to make sure I strike it correctly and the ball is supposed to go along the line of the string and into the hole. As I was doing this I was wearing a metronome the size of a matchbox on the peak of my cap.

In practice, Fooch [Mark Fulcher], my caddie, and I have been lining up my putts. I have not used him in this way before, but I think teamwork is good. Four eyes are better than two, perhaps.

We also tried to read the line of every one of my putts in my practice rounds, to help us to get a feel of working together. Normally in a practice round you hit a ball or two at the flag and then a few more at where you think the flags are going to be during the week. I hope that by the pair of us reading the line of every putt, as well as doing our homework on where the flags may be, it will be beneficial to me this week.

Monday’s round was not great, so Nick Bradley, my coach, and I had a short, sharp 30 minutes on the practice ground. I had been taking the club back a little too much on the inside. We dealt with that after the round and on Tuesday there was an immediate improvement. I felt much more comfortable.

This week is going to be all about scoring well. A lot of our play may not look pretty, but it is the figure that is written down for each hole that counts. Ten years ago I was Seve-esque. I was in the rough, I was in bunkers, I was all over the place. But I believed in myself. That is what I must have this week, a really strong sense of self-belief. I have to be mentally as strong as I can be. It is going to be worth it. What a prize it would be to win the Open. That would be cool.