One Direction find 'new fifth member' in world golf No.1 Rory McIlroy

The sportsman joins the band following Horan’s career turn as a caddy ahead of the Masters tournament

One Direction without Zayn Malik, who quit the band in March (Getty Images)

One Direction’s search for Zayn Malik's replacement is officially over.

And this time, it wasn’t the work of an ingenious new talent show format dreamt up by pop puppet master Simon Cowell.

Instead, the recruitment was left down to Niall Horan, who went particularly off piste to make a selection on the band’s behalf.

Step up, the world’s No.1 golfer, Rory McIlroy, who’ll be joining the band on stage in exchange for Horan’s expert caddying ahead of the Masters tournament last week.

He’ll be making his debut at the Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts on 12 September.

“He’s allowed to pick the song, that was part of the deal,” Horan told The Sun. And yes, sadly, this is a one-off. For now.

Rory McIlroy: New One Direction member? (Getty Images)

“If I went on the bag with him he would come on stage and sing with us. Apparently he’s terrible.”

Malik quit the band in March after leaving the Asian leg of the world tour with stress-related health issues.

Since then, there has been speculation that the remaining members - Horan, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne - have also parted ways with their management team, Modest Management.

Rumours of the breakup began to circulate among Directioners on Twitter following Modest’s website account being suspended over the weekend.

Remaining members Niall, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne insisted they would continue without him, but Harry broke down in tears during their first gig as a foursome in Jakarta, Indonesia.

After seeing him, one fan wrote: “I didn’t think my heart could break any more than it has.”