Emirate Golf Club Archives - Golf Digest Middle East

Get your souvenir Dubai Moonlight Classic Daily News wrap edition FREE here

Kent Gray — Fri, 29 Oct 2021 19:54:51 +0000

By Kent Gray
What. A. Finish.

Catch up on Bronte Law’s clutch victory in the final edition of our Dubai Moonlight Classic ‘Daily News’ for 2021.

Our wrap of Friday on the Faldo is available FREE here. Alternatively, or simply scroll through the ISSUU link below or download Saturday’s Daily News to your favourite device to read offline or keep for prosperity.

The post Get your souvenir Dubai Moonlight Classic Daily News wrap edition FREE here appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Hideki Matsuyama’s heir apparent has made a steady start to his Desert Classic debut

Golf Digest Middle East — Thu, 28 Jan 2021 17:59:24 +0000

By Joy Chakravarty
Takumi Kanaya has showed once again why he is widely considered as the heir apparent to Hideki Matsuyama as the next superstar of Japanese golf.

After an agonising wait of more than 10 minutes on the 1st tee as early-morning mist hugged the fairways, the former amateur world No1 started his maiden European Tour round with birdies on his first two holes.

He then overcame a stutter, four bogeys in five holes from the 5th, with a brilliant return to the clubhouse played in four-under par 33 to sign for a two-under 70.

Kanaya is one of the tournament invitees this year, continuing the OMEGA Dubai Desert Classic’s tradition of featuring some of the finest young names in the game each year.

The 22-year-old from Hiroshima possesses a stupendous CV. He first served notice by finishing second in the 2017 Japan Open, a tournament that is regarded by many as tougher than the U.S. Open given how the golf course is set up for the week.

Kanaya turned professional in October last year after playing in the U.S. Open and also featured in the Masters and the Open Championship in 2019 by virtue of winning the 2018 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship. He also won a title on the Japan Golf Tour (the 2020 Mitsui Sumitomo Visa Taiheiyo Masters) as an amateur and was awarded the 2020 Mark McCormack Medal for occupying the No1 spot on the World Amateur Golf Rankings for 55 weeks.

Within five weeks of joining the paid ranks, Kanaya won the flagship event of the Japan Golf Tour – the Dunlop Phoenix Open – and has made rapid strides to rise to 124th in the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR).

“I am happy with the start. It looked like things were getting out of my hands in the middle but I am proud of the way I pulled it back,” said Kanaya, who is graduating from Tohoku Fukushi University in March this year. His idol and go-to person for golf and life advise, Matsuyama, is also an alumni there.

“I am very thankful to the Omega Dubai Desert Classic for giving me an invite. I am also playing in Saudi Arabia next week, and then there will be a big gap as I will wait for the JGTO Tour to start in April. So, it is very important for me to do well this week.

“My immediate goal is to break into the top-100 of the world rankings so that I get to play in the PGA Championship later this year. That’s the only major that I have not played so far in my career, so that would be nice. Of course, if I get into the top-50 somehow before April and make it to Augusta National, that won’t be too bad either.”

His first trip to Dubai has been a bit of a disappointment, but that has nothing to do with his performance on the golf course.

“I had heard so much about Dubai and I wanted to go and see a few places. However, we are in a bubble and we cannot even step out of the hotel. It’s a bit of shame and hopefully, I can come back when things are normal,” said Kanaya.

Iron play and putting are the strongest part of Kanaya’s game but even they could not help him recover from errant drives in the middle of the round.

“I drove very poorly in that stretch. I was in the left rough on the 5th, then right rough in the 6th, then in the right desert on the 8th and right rough on the 9th…all with my drives. The lie on 5th was so bad that I needed to chip out safely,” explained Kanaya, who trains with Australian Gareth Jones, Japan’s National Team coach.

“Thankfully, I managed to sort out my issues with the driver on the back nine. Hopefully, I can do even better tomorrow and get into contention by Sunday afternoon.”

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Viktor Hovland and Beef draw random clubs out of hat, play Dubai Desert Classic’s 18th hole, chaos ensues

Golf Digest Middle East — Sun, 26 Jan 2020 07:31:32 +0000

By Coleman Bentley
They say a good craftsman never blames their tools . . . but that’s only if they get to choose them. You don’t see welders spinning giant wheels of misfortune to see if they get to use their welding kit or have to make do with Elmer’s glue and a spoon. That would be nuts. Thankfully for us, however, the folks on the European Tour’s Content Committee are a little nuts, because this is precisely the situation they presented to Viktor Hovland and Andrew “Beef” Johnston on Friday: Play the Dubai Desert Classic’s 18th hole, lowest score wins . . . but at every shot, you have to pull a random club designation out of a bag. Needless to say, things got weird.

Beef ?Hovland #LuckOfTheDraw ??#ODDC @OMEGAGolfDubai pic.twitter.com/d0glMwwGQj

— The European Tour (@EuropeanTour) January 24, 2020

You know it’s about to get wacky when Beef draws a lob wedge off the tee. You can’t ask for a more sadistic combination than that. Hovland draws a four iron and puts in the fairway, but soon gets his comeuppance when a three iron rears its ugly head from the first cut from 127 yards. Beef follows that with the shot of the segment, somehow managing to hold a four-iron from 97 yards on the putting surface despite a downright disturbing lie.

After getting relief from the grandstands, nearly hitting it in the water, and coming a mere inch from holing a chip, Hovland picks it up for six, leaving Beef with a long putt from the back of the green for the win . . . with an eight iron, of course. After leaving it about six feet short, Beef pours in a two iron to halve the hole. Everyone goes home happy, albeit with some pretty fried nerves.

Overall, a pretty fun to way to kick off a pretty fun conceit. We hope to see more of this post-Dubai Desert Classic, perhaps at the Masters. Something tells us Augusta National will absolutely LOVE this sort of hi-jinx. In the meantime, feel free to try this at your local GC as long you don’t mind never being invited back.

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