There have been many great major champions, but have there been any quite like Padraig Harrington, the most approachable and amenable of them all?

Would anyone else, for instance, play in a minor event a week before making a defence of the Open Championship, turning up a day early to play in the pro-am because somebody had asked nicely? I think not.

While many of the world’s top players are competing at the Barclays Scottish Open at Loch Lomond this week, Harrington is to be found at the Ladbrokes.com Irish PGA Championship, playing among tour wannabes and club professionals. And his humility is something to behold.

Some might suggest that such low-key preparation is not ideal for Turnberry next week. However, Harrington has turned it to his advantage in previous years — he won here at The European Club, an hour south of Dublin, in 2007 and 2008, and followed up each time by winning the Claret Jug a week later — and this year he is attempting to play his way back into form after a slump in which he has missed five halfway cuts in succession. There is also a shrewdness in his decision, a chance to play a links course prepared especially for him: the rough has been grown in tight to the fairways and to the length expected to be found at Turnberry. Which is why it was fascinating to watch the Irishman going about his business in the first round yesterday.

After missing the cut at the French Open last week, Harrington stayed around for an extra day in an attempt to rediscover his touch on the greens and then flew to Scotland for a couple of days’ practice at the Open Championship venue. What he found was “savage rough” — and an early strategy.

Except for one hole yesterday, the driver stayed in the bag in his three-under-par round of 68. For the most part he took no more than a three-wood off the tee and on most of the holes he used irons. That does not guarantee that he will do the same in Scotland, but he has missed so many fairways recently that he needs to rediscover his accuracy and to experience that winning feeling once more.

Add to that five single putts in the first eight holes and an exquisite shot from the most frightening bunker on the course at the par-five 3rd that set up his second birdie on the trot and things were beginning to look up.

Most impressive has been Harrington’s equanimity in adversity. Never once has he failed to acknowledge those around him in recent weeks. And quite what Tiger Woods’s handlers would have made of the galleries wandering down the fairways alongside their man can only be guessed at. Harrington simply fed off the goodwill. On the practice range before the pro-am, one amateur was about to start hitting balls when he realised that he had taken Harrington’s spot and sheepishly stood aside. “I’ve not squeezed you out, have I?” the three-times major champion asked. Most amazingly, he was completely sincere.

This is a champion who has experienced triumph and disaster and treated those twin impostors just the same. It should not be long before he is back where he belongs. He would expect nothing less.

Top-class field at Loch Lomond

The Barclays Scottish Open, which starts this morning at Loch Lomond, has eight of the world’s top 25 players competing for a first prize of £500,000 (John Hopkins writes). Ángel Cabrera, the winner of this year’s Masters, is joined by Graeme McDowell, the defending champion, and Ernie Els, Lee Westwood, Colin Montgomerie, all past winners, among others. But it is the tournament that follows this one that many of the players in the field have their eyes on, namely the Open at Turnberry.