World No. 1 Rory McIlroy insists he will continue to play football despite the fear of only just avoiding surgery on his injured left leg.

McIlroy tees-up tomorrow in the defence of his PGA Championship title less than six weeks after rupturing a tendon in a footy friendly back home in Belfast.

The injury meant sitting out contesting the Scottish Open and teeing-up as defending champion in the following week’s Open Championship and also last week’s WGC – Bridgestone Invitational in Ohio.

“I first thought I had broken my ankle as soon as I went over I heard like a snap,” he said.

Wolrld No. 1 Rory McIlroy reveals he felt he may have broken his leg in last month’s friendly footy game. (Photo – www.golffile.ie)

“But then that was the ligament that snapped while I also snapped the joint capsule, so that’s why I looked down at my ankle and 30 seconds later it got to the size of a tennis ball, basically because all the fluid came out of the joint capsule, so it just filled up.

“The scan I had revealed I had totally ruptured one ligament and I had a grade two tear in the other, and if that had been a total rupture in that then that would have meant surgery.  So luckily that was not the case.

“I was lucky that I didn’t do more damage and thankfully after five weeks of hard work and rehab I was first back walking again the week of The Open and now  I’m back playing.

“So while I am not going to stop doing what I am doing like football because I am enjoy that part of my life, as it’s something I’ve done as a kid, though I may to now wear ankle braces.”

However more than five rounds of golf last week at the Quinta da Lago club on the Portuguese Algarve, and the confidence of putting his leg to the test over three days this week on the Lake Michigan shoreline, and McIlroy has the bit between his teeth to capture a third event this season and a fifth Major crown.

Rory McIlroy faces the golf media for a first time since injuring his left leg. Picture Eoin Clarke, www.golffile.ie

“I have come here expecting to play well and I don’t see any reason why I can’t bring the sort of form I have been showing in practice rounds and on the range to the tee on Thursday,” he said.

McIlroy will play the opening two rounds in the company of the two Majors winners from this year – Jordan Spieth and his fellow American and Open Champion Zach Johnson.

And McIlroy, as well as every other non-American, will be striving to stop a Stars and Stripes white-wash off the four Majors for a first occasion since 1982.

“If you go by this year, Jordan is the best player in the world right now, and I would go so far to say if you go back over the last two years, it is probably a toss-up between Jordan and myself,” said McIlroy.

“But then I won this event first in 2012 and again last year, so that’s two out of the last three years which is quite an honour.

“And to try and make it three out of the past four years this week would be a further honour.”