The Hindu : Sport / Golf : Phatlum wins Indian Open; Smriti finishes sixth

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Phatlum wins Indian Open; Smriti finishes sixth

Rakesh Rao

GURGAON: The challengers fell back and made things easy for front-runner Pornanong Phatlum to win the $120,000 DLF women’s Indian Open golf championship here on Saturday.

The 18-year-old Thai never trailed in the three-day event and emerged a worthy champion with a four-shot margin. On the final day, Phatlum’s par round was far less eventful as compared to her cards on the first two days as she adopted a safety-first approach.

She collected a second cheque for $18,000 this year, having won a similar amount for beating the field in the Thailand Open last month. She now plans to play the Qualifying School of the USLPA.

Making amends

Phatlum found par on 16 holes today. She dropped a shot on the par-four second hole, but made amends with a birdie on the par-four 17th. She was the only player to remain under-par for 54 holes, her tally being four-under 212. Phatlum was clearly the most focused player in simmering conditions at the DLF Golf and Country Club here this week.

“The title takes away all the tiredness,” said the shy champion after a job well done.

Chinese Taipie’s Wei Jun Jye and Japan’s Yuki Sakurai shared the second spot at 216. For the better part of the day, Sakurai was the closest to the eventual champion but dropped three shots on the last 10 holes, including the last one.

In sharp contrast, Wei birdied the last three holes to get a share of the second place. The duo got $10,500 each.

Chun joint fourth

China’s World Cupper, Wang Chun, the nearest challenger to Phatlum at the start of the final round, faded away with a 75 and shared the fourth spot.

Smriti Mehra produced her first par round of the competition to walk away with the sixth-place cheque of $4,080. Though Smriti was never in contention for the top prize, she remained pleased with yet another top-10 finish.

Chinese Taipie’s Yu-Ling Hsien matched Smriti’s tally of 218 to emerge as the best amateur on view.

On a day when Irina Brar withdrew, one encouraging feature for the Indians was the performance of Tanya Wadhwa. The teen amateur aggregated 226 to tie for the 19th place, ahead of several home grown professionals.

Hole-in-one

Surprisingly, for the third straight day, there was a hole-in-one. Japan’s Satoko Hasegawa slammed a 5-iron to find the hole on the 181-yard 11th hole. Roommates Huei-Ju Shih and Kuan-Pei Chen from Chinese Taipei were the others to hit hole-in-one.

The trio shared the Rs. 50,000 prize put up by Sudhir Gensets.

The scores:

Pornanong Phatlum (Tha) (70, 70, 72): 212; Wei Jun Jye (Tpe) (74, 71, 71), Yuki Sakurai (Jpn) (73, 70, 73): 216; Ji Nam Min (Kor) (75, 72, 70), Wang Chun (Chn) (73, 69, 75): 217; Yu Ling Hsien (A) (Tpe) (75, 72, 71), Smriti Mehra (73, 73, 72): 218.

Other Indians: Tanya Wadhwa (A) (77, 75, 74): 226; Sharmila Nicollet (A) (79, 73, 78): 230; Sanya Sharma (80, 78, 78): 236; Nalini Singh (81, 76, 82), Gauri Monga (A) (83, 77, 79): 239; Nonita Lall Qureshi (86, 75, 80): 241; Shalini Malik (86, 77, 82), Parnita Garewal (82, 85, 78): 245; Gurbani Singh (A) (81 86, 82) 249; Vandana Agarwal (86, 84, 80): 250; Meher Atwal (A) (84, 86, 81): 251; Sonavi Chopra (A) (83, 87, 85): 255; Pallavi Jain (85, 87, 86): 258; Seema Sobti (84, 86, 89), Nikki Ponappa (87, 87, 85): 259; Preetinder Kaur (88, 85, 87), Neha Tripathi (A) (89, 86, 85): 260.

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