My game wasn't where it should have been at all at the start of the year. I got into a couple of bad habits on my swing, and it just took me a little bit of time to get out of them.

I am a proud product of Irish golf and the Golfing Union of Ireland and am hugely honoured to have come from very rich Irish sporting roots I am also a proud Ulsterman who grew up in Northern Ireland. That is my background and always will be.

I think there came a time - probably when I was about 13 - when I started to struggle with an increasing volume of schoolwork and the demands from my golfing schedule and aspirations. I'm not sure if the decision to leave school was very clear in my mind then but I did know that in the juggling between the two, my energies were most definitely in the golfing direction.

I feel like I came through this year stronger and wiser, and I can go into 2015 in a much better place.

I'm afraid there are no replays or second chances in amateur or professional golf, and that's the way it should be.

I've had support from all sides, from people who call themselves Irish, from Northern Irish, to the whole of the UK, to people in America, and it would be terrible for me to segregate myself from one of those groups that support me so much.

It's a great feeling to know that I've played the best golf throughout the season of any of the guys for the second time in three years, it's really nice.