The Hindu : Sport / Golf : Karan Bindra stuns Ashok

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 27, 2005

Sport

Sport - Golf

Karan Bindra stuns Ashok

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: Karan Bindra finished one of the most eventful days of his career on a memorable note when he knocked out second seed Ashok Kumar on the fourth playoff hole in the all India SRF matchplay golf championship at the Delhi Golf Club course here on Tuesday.

The day also saw the defeats of the 2002 champion Shiv Prakash, Amritinder Singh and Gurbaaz Mann, seeded 14 to 16 in that order. Third seed Shiv Kapur withdrew from the competition after an old cervical spasm played up again.

Exciting finish

All other seeds, headed by Mukesh Kumar, made it to the second round. In an exciting finish, sixth seed Rafick Ali needed a fortuitous chipped `eagle' from about 50 yards to get past Sheeraz Kalra on the final hole.

Down by three after seven holes, Bindra caught up with Ashok on the 17th hole and then held his nerves on the 18th to putt from eight feet. This forced a playoff since Ashok had drained a 12-foot putt.

After three playoff holes were halved, Ashok missed a return putt from five feet for a bogey while Bindra putted from three feet to earn a second-round clash with Mohammad Salim.

Bindra, a teaching pro at the DLF Golf and Country Club at Gurgaon, almost did not report on time after being caught in a traffic jam. He eventually reported on the first tee with less than two minutes remaining. In fact, he wore his golf shoes on the first tee and straightaway produced a perfect drive.

Perfect birdie

He duffed his second shot but came up with a perfect 25-foot birdie putt to go one up on Ashok. But on the next three holes, it was Ashok who came up trumps. Bindra birdied the fifth but Ashok pulled away further by taking the next two holes to stretch his lead to three. However, as it turned out, Ashok never won a hole for the remainder of the day. Bindra won the ninth, 14th and 17th to bridge the gap and force the playoff.

"After I was three down after seven holes, it looked one sided," said Bindra, who plays very few tournaments. "But I wanted to play as many holes as possible and slowly started pushing Ashok. In the last 11 holes, I had three birdied and three-putted just once. I guess, I gave Ashok no space to breath."

Ashok was "very happy for Karan." Despite the loss, Ashok was all praise for his conqueror and said, "I played better than I did on Sunday (to win the shootout) but Karan played very well after being down."

The results (First round) (prefix denotes seeding): 1-Mukesh Kumar bt Rajesh Chaudhary 2 and 1; Dinesh Kumar bt Amit Dube 19th hole; Raju Ali bt 16-Gurbaaz Mann 2 and 1; Randhir Ghotra bt Suleman Ali 3 and 1; 8-Arjun Singh bt Akbar Ali 6 and 5; Pappan bt P.S. Guleria 5 and 4; 9-Harinder Gupta bt Rohtas Singh 6 and 4; Bhoop Singh bt Rahul Ganapathy 19th hole; 4-Digvijay Singh bt Zai Kipgen 3 and 1; Basad Ali bt Ali Sher 3 and 1; 13-Sanjay Kumar bt Monish Bindra 2 and 1; Vinod Kumar bt D. S. Raghuvanshi 2 up; 5-Vijay Kumar bt Toran Shahi 5 and 3; Gast Ram bt Naman Dawar 19th hole; 12-Yusuf Ali bt Mohammad Maqbool 3 and 2; Sujjan Singh bt C. Muniyappa 1 up; Karan Bindra bt 2-Ashok Kumar 22nd hole; Mohammad Salim bt Jaiveer Virk 19th hole; Vivek Bhandari bt 15-Amritinder Singh 1 up; 18-Uttam Singh Mundy bt Roop Singh 1 up; 7-S. S. P. Chaurasia received a walkover from D. Patel; Mohammad Islam bt Binod Pandey 3 and 2; 10-Feroz Ali bt Vikramjit Singh 4 and 3; Shamim Khan bt Gurki Shergill 8 and 7; Balbir Verma received a walkover from 3-Shiv Kapur; Nabin Mondal bt A. S. Lehal 19th hole; Sachin Nigade bt 14-Shiv Prakash 19th hole; Vishal Singh bt Chini Ali 1 up; 6-Rafick Ali bt Sheeraz Kalra 1 up; Jumman bt S. Madaiah 4 and 2; Ranjit Singh bt Mohammad Kokhan 3 and 2; Ajay Gupta bt Sandeep Syal 19th hole.

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