​SOUTHPORT, England — Jackson Suber got his first taste of links golf — on his first trip to Europe — when he arrived at Royal Birkdale. Three days later, he proved to be a quick study with a superb par save and a 6-foot eagle late in his round for a 5-under 65 to lead The Open ChampionshipBryson DeChambeau might be getting the hang of this, too, no matter what three-time Open Championship champion Nick Faldo thinks about his strategy.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAn opening round lasting some 15 hours included just about everything during a warm and breezy start. Five of the leading 12 players were playing The Open for the first time. Rory McIlroy missed three 4-foot putts in a four-hole span and had six bogeys in his round of 72. Scottie Scheffler opened with four birdies in six holes and didn’t make another the rest of the way for a 68.Most startling was Suber, a 26-year-old American who has yet to win anywhere since leaving Ole Miss and is playing in only his third major. He made a tough par save on the new par-3 15th with slopes off severely on both sides. He followed with a 6-foot birdie on the 16th and then choked up on a 4-iron from 233 yards and hit it to 6 feet for eagle.Not bad for his seventh round in any major, and first on a links course as tough as Birkdale.“Just kind of kept the ball in good spots and didn’t put much pressure on my game to make pars,” Suber said.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementHe led by one shot over Sungjae Im and Dan Brown of England. The nine players at 67 include four Open debutants — Alex Smalley, Ryan Gerard, M.J. Daffue, Pierceson Coody.And then there was DeChambeau, who has missed the cut in all three majors this year and has chosen not to speak to the media since Friday at the Masters, except for on LIV Golf.Turns out he had enough strategy to get in the mix, often ripping driver to take the fearsome bunkers out of play and doing enough right for a 67 that left him two shots behind.Strategy became a talking point when Faldo told the Sky Sports Golf Podcast this week, “DeChambeau has zero clue of strategy. He said last year, ‘I’m going to go out and attack the links’. Well, I’ve never attacked a links. You thread it, don’t you? You feed it down the fairway. … You don’t think, ‘Oh, I’ll just blast it down there.’”AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementDeChambeau hit only four fairways but missed only three greens, though he was rarely in big trouble when he wasn’t in the short grass.He twice blasted tee shots over the trouble and close to the green at the par-4 second and the par-4 10th, the latter a blind shot. He made birdie on both. And while Jon Rahm was among those who said going long can lead to trouble at some point, the only two shots DeChambeau dropped came from his putting (the par-5 14th) and chipping (the par-4 18th).He was tied for the early lead until going from wispy rough over the back of the 18th, chipped weakly to 8 feet and missed t