'˜I've been really low' - Danny Willett admits to struggling for confidence during battle for form

But the Sheffield golfer says he will take a great deal of heart from his impressive performance at the Italian Open over the weekend.

Willett delivered his best tournament finish in 16 months as he tied for eighth in Brescia with the type of consistent play which saw him become one of Europe’s top players.

His struggles since winning The Masters in April 2016 have been well-documented as injury and a lack of form have blighted his game, causing him to fall to 462nd in the world before his weekend efforts saw him climb to 401st.

Despite tireless work to rebuild his game and rediscover form, Willett says finding confidence has been most difficult.

“It’s a really fine line with confidence,” the Hackenthorpe-born 30-year-old said.

“You can feel like you’re playing good golf and not having results.

“But you’re talking about no results – literally zero – so it’s been a tough run to kind of keep the chin up and keep working hard.

“It’s easy to take it easy and say, well, I’ll write this bit off and this bit off.”

Willett carded only five bogies across 72 holes at the Italian Open in what was a rather surprise upturn midway through a season which had previously delivered just one successful making of the cut.

Regardless of his scoring at the weekend, he says simple shot making was enough to deliver a big boost to his confidence.

He said; “It’s a nice confidence because any confidence is great.

“Obviously I’ve been really low.

“So to hit some of the shots out there that I wouldn’t ordinarily see and I couldn’t do before.

“The good shots are a lot better than they were and the bad ones are getting to where they are okay.

“We’ve been doing a lot of work and things have been feeling close.

“It’s nice that things are kind of getting there.”

Replicating his efforts in Italy on a consistent basis is the ultimate target for the Rotherham Golf Club member.

His next outing will be at the US Open in New York State on June 14, where he will face the inevitable scrutiny status as a Major winner brings.

And he says the work will continue to get back to his best form and begin to deliver the results he craves.

He said: “I think it’s going to be a better version of where we were at.

“It’s just taken a long, long time to get there.

“Confidence should come obviously with just doing it more and more.

“But as players, we like to see results.”