GOLF/US PGA Championship: In the end, it wasn't any inconvenience at all. Phil Mickelson returned to the US PGA at Baltusrol yesterday for unfinished business and duly completed his weather-interrupted final round.

But securing victory was no easy matter; it was a closer-run thing than he'd have liked, and required a birdie on the 72nd hole - where he played a deft chip out of thick greenside rough to set up a short putt, his 276th stroke of the championship - to put closure on the season's fourth major.

So it was that Mickelson - a pillar-to-post winner - took his second career major, adding the PGA title to the US Masters he collected a year ago. On Sunday evening, as thunder clapped overhead and the dark clouds brought an ominous presence, Mickelson, one of 12 players left on the course, was forced to halt his march towards destiny. It was to prove to be merely a temporary setback.

Yesterday, with the storm clouds dissipated, the all-American boy with the all-American family - his three children performing a jig of delight on the 18th green to celebrate the victory - came back to complete the four and a bit holes that would crown him as this major's 87th champion and move him back to third in the official world rankings.

In finishing with a 72 for 276, four-under-par, Mickelson had one stroke to spare over runners-up Thomas Bjorn and Steve Elkington, both of whom failed with their birdie putts on the last, while Tiger Woods - who had mounted a weekend charge having barely survived the midway cut - finished in tied-fourth with Davis Love III, a player who could only par his way home having lost ground on the front nine on Sunday.

In truth, each and every one of the top five finishers will believe that this was a major there to be won.

Yet, it was Mickelson, so often the fall guy until finally discovering the art of closing out at the Masters last year, who was able to grind out the win.

To do so, though, the 35-year-old had to do it the hard way, becoming the first player since Payne Stewart in 1989 to win the PGA by a stroke with a birdie on the final green.

That it should go to the death was due to a number of factors, one being the inability of his closest challengers to achieve a similar closing birdie.

Mickelson had opened the door with his only dropped shot of yesterday's conclusion to his round at the 16th. There, his tee-shot plunged into a greenside bunker and gave him a fried-egg lie in the sand. He could only splash out to 25 feet, and missed the par save.

Up ahead, Elkington and Bjorn each had chances to birdie the 18th. The Australian got a huge stroke of good luck on the finishing hole. After viciously hooking his drive, the ball rebounded off a tree into the middle of the fairway. That's where his luck ended.

His lay-up finished in a divot but, undeterred, he produced an exquisite approach to eight feet to set up his birdie chance. However, he failed to convert it.

Bjorn had resurrected his title hopes with a birdie on the 17th. When the Dane unleashed a massive drive down the 18th, it appeared as if a birdie was odds-on. He had 238 yards to the flag, perfect for his five-wood.

The only problem was that Bjorn, in a tactical move, had taken that club out of his bag for the week and opted to have a three-wood and a seven-wood. Between clubs, he opted to use the three-wood and pulled it left into a greenside bunker. To compound matters, the ball finished on a downslope in the bunker.

He played out to 20 feet short of the hole, and then watched as his birdie putt agonisingly lipped out.

All that was left was for Elkington and Bjorn - both finished on three-under - to sit in silence in the recorder's hut and watch on television as Mickelson negotiated his way up the 18th. Finding the middle of the fairway with his drive, Mickelson had 247 yards to the flag and put his trusty four-wood into his hands.

For good measure, he tapped the commemorative plaque to Jack Nicklaus that was positioned just a matter of yards ahead of him in the fairway.

If he was seeking inspiration, it didn't work. His approach ploughed into heavy greenside rough. But there are few players with the short game wizardry of Mickelson. He later explained: "We had some pretty thick rough in our backyard and that's exactly what I was thinking on 18, that this is no different from what I've done in my backyard since I was a kid . . .

"I went in aggressively and the ball popped up beautifully and trickled to the hole."

All that was left was for Mickelson to hole out the three-footer for his birdie. On more than one occasion in the old days, such a putt would have spun out. This time, it rolled into the middle of the cup to give him his second major.

"You're halfway to the career Grand Slam," someone told him. "It's hard for me to look that far ahead yet . . . but that's certainly a long-term goal, to get the other two," replied Mickelson, adding: "Right now, I just want to savour this. It was one of the most stressful tournaments for me because I was in the lead or tied for it every night."

At least he could peer at the Wanamaker Trophy and know that every moment of stress was well worth it.