Daniel Gavins recovered after twice finding the water on the 18th hole to clinch a dramatic one-shot victory at the Ras Al Khaimah Championship on Sunday.
Gavins began the final round two shots behind leader Zander Lombard, but the Englishman moved ahead with a run of five successive birdies immediately after bogeying the first.
Two strokes separated Gavins from the pursuing Alexander Bjork ahead of the final hole, where the leader initially appeared to have thrown the title away in remarkable circumstances.
Gavins drove into the water and did likewise with his approach, before pulling a 26-foot putt out of the bag to finish with a double bogey and leave him waiting anxiously on his competitors.
Bjork put himself out of the running with a bogey before Lombard missed an eagle putt to tie things up, handing Gavins his second DP World Tour victory 18 months after his first – which came at the ISPS Handa World Invitational in August 2021.
Speaking after the dramatic finish, Gavins said: "I am pretty speechless. I thought I had [thrown it away]. I put two in the water and thought 'that's one way to end the tournament'.
"I've been struggling off the tee the last two weeks and it's not a very nice tee shot to have on 18, even with a lead.
"It was a difficult hole to get through and to be fair I thought I was holing that putt for a play-off. I didn't realise Bjork had made bogey.
"I sunk the putt and went to the back of the green and saw that I was actually winning still. It was kind of a big shock."
Bjork and Lombard were tied for second on 16-under-par, while Adrian Meronk and Thorbjorn Olesen finished one shot behind the duo in a share of fourth.
Twin brothers Rasmus and Nicolai Hojgaard began the day in contention, but the former finished 14-under and the latter dropped off to finish three shots further back.
Rory McIlroy soars to lead on third day of Ohio Memorial
Rory McIlroy has moved to the lead in the Memorial despite going five holes without hitting a green, finishing the third day tied in first place with Si Woo Kim and David Lipsky at Muirfield Village on Saturday.
McIlroy did what he had to do while players around him struggled, finishing the day with two under par with four birdies and two bogeys.
“That’s what happens when conditions are like this,” McIlroy said after the day’s play. “You just have to hang on.
“I was really happy with how I scored out there, and how I just sort of hung in there for most of the day.”
The birdies came in good time for McIlroy, picking up three on the last seven holes, and finishing the day with a par, unlike he did on day one, when he hit a triple bogey on the 18th hole.
“It would mean a ton to me to win this tournament, I’ve played pretty well here over the years without really having a realistic chance to win,” McIlroy said.
“So to be able to walk up that hill from 18 and get that handshake from Jack (Nicklaus) would be pretty nice.”
McIlroy, now on six under par, will need to maintain his form into the last day with a log-jam of talent at the top of the leaderboard, with thirteen players separated by just two shots and nine others within three shots.
Friday’s leader and former Memorial winner, Hideki Matsuyama dropped dramatically in consistency, putting him in tied ninth place.
Matsuyama had five bogeys during the day and a triple bogey on the 12th hole.
Englishmen Danny Willet and Matt Fitzpatrick both had solid days with 69 and 70 respectively, finishing tied in 23rd place on two under par.
Ryan Lue & Jodi Munn-Barrow take early lead in JGA National Senior Trials
Sixteen-year-old Ryan Lue and Jodi Munn-Barrow are the early leaders at the National Senior Trials which teed off on Friday at the Half Moon Golf Course in St. James. The trials will be used to select Jamaica’s team for the 66th Caribbean Amateur Golf Championship.
Lue posted two under-par 70 to be the only golfer to post an under-par score at the end of the first round.
His scorecard showed three birdies on the front nine on holes two, eight and nine for a three under- par 33.
He then started the back nine positively with a birdie on hole number ten and was four under par at that point but was pegged back by two bogeys on holes fifteen and seventeen, to close the round with a three-stroke lead over Zandre Roye.
Roye scored one over par 73 for his second place at the end of the round.
Former national golf champion, Sean Morris, was a close third on two over-par 74 but four strokes off the lead.
The 2022 national golf champion, Oshae Haye, was not far off on 75.
The current national golf champion, William Knibbs, and Dr. Mark Newnham were holding down the fifth spot on four over par 76 each.
The top two ladies on the course were closely bunched together and are within one shot of each other. The Jamaica Golf Association president Jodi Munn-Barrow was on nine over par 81 while Mattea Issa was in second place on ten over par 82.
"Conditions were very difficult today. A lot of rain has fallen in Montego Bay so the course was extremely wet. While we were playing there was rain so it was very, very hard condition to play under but overall happy with the outcome. Did leave some on the course but look forward to tomorrow" said Munn-Barrow.
The other female in the field was Anoushka Khatri who posted 93 for third place.
The golfers are set to tee off at 9:30 am Saturday for the second round.
David Law tames the Green Monster course to move into contention in Hamburg
Scotland’s David Law produced a “pretty unbelievable” second round to lie a shot off the halfway lead in the Porsche European Open in Hamburg.
Law tamed a 7,455-yard course known as the Green Monster as he fired an eagle and eight birdies in a seven-under-par 66, a nine-shot improvement on his opening 75.
That drew high praise from the man at the top of the leaderboard, Germany’s Max Kieffer adding a 71 to his opening 69 to reach six under par, a shot ahead of Law, England’s Jordan Smith and Northern Ireland’s Tom McKibbin.
“First of all, seven under is pretty unbelievable,” Kieffer said when told of Law’s score. “That’s a crazy round of golf.
“It’s playing quite long, even though it’s a bit shorter this year than the last few years. There’s lots of water, the greens are quite undulated.
“If you hit a loose shot here and there, usually on every hole there’s a bit of trouble. It’s a very tough course.”
Law could easily have gone even lower than 66 after starting on the back nine and following six birdies in his first eight holes with an eagle on the par-five 18th to be out in 30.
A bogey on the second halted his momentum and although he birdied the fourth and seventh, Law bogeyed his last two holes of the day.
“I went out there just trying to play golf and make birdies and score as low as I can,” the 32-year-old said. “The brakes came on a bit on the back nine, but it’s a difficult course, it’s tough.
“The goal is to keep doing what we were doing. I tried hard on the back nine to keep in the present and make birdies like we were, but it didn’t happen. Barring the last two holes we played really nice on that second nine.”
Arguably the shot of the day belonged to Law’s compatriot Ewen Ferguson, who putted out of a bunker on the 14th and holed from 25 feet for birdie.
“The sand is very firm and compact,” Ferguson said after a 72 left him three off the lead.
“It was a narrow green and I thought if I didn’t get the strike right (with a sand wedge) it could have trickled into the water or I had to go left of the pin.
“I thought I’d putt it and it rolled nicely didn’t it? I’ve never had that before. You just have to go for it and see what happens. Just smash it out and get lucky.”
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