By Ryan Herrington
Golfers often have trouble sleeping the night before the final round of a tournament. Wade Ormsby was concerned about getting any rest after the conclusion of the UBS Hong Kong Open, when the 37-year-old Australian who has been to Q school four times since first getting his European Tour card, finally pulled out a victory in the opening event of the 2017-’18 season.

“It means a lot to me,” said Ormsby after finally winning in his 264th Euro Tour start. “I’ve played a lot of golf in Europe, everywhere, and a few bumps along the way but it’s pretty cool to get a win this late in your career. … I probably won’t sleep too much on that flight on the way to Oz tonight.”

Ormsby shot a closing two-under 68 at Hong Kong Golf Club to finish at 11-under 269. His victory came with some help from his fellow competitors. India’s S.S.P. Chawrasia, the 54-hole leader was four strokes ahead of Ormsby at one point on Sunday only to make a triple bogey on the ninth hole and bring most of the field back into the event.

After shooting an even-par 34 on the front side, Ormsby birdied three of his next eight holes to take a two-stroke lead. But a three-putt bogey on the par-4 18th looked like Ormsby’s nerves might cost him the outright title. With a chance to force a playoff, however, eventual runners-up Alexander Bjork bogeyed the 18th and Paul Peterson and Julian Suri couldn’t birdie the home hole.

The last pursuer with a chance to catch Ormsby was Rafa Cabrera Bello, who birdied the 17th to match the Aussie at 11 under. On the 18th, however, the Spaniard hit his approach shot into a bunker and left himself a 10-foot par putt to match Ormsby, only to miss it right.

Among the other notable finishers in the European Tour’s season-opener: Tommy Fleetwood, crowned a week prior as the Race to Dubai champ for 2016-’17, closed with a one-under 69 to finish solo sixth; Miguel Angel Jimenez made seven birdies for a final-round 63 to jump into a tie for seventh; and Justin Rose claimed a T-10 showing with a closing 68.

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The cautious manner in which the now two-time champion, S.S.P. (Shiv Sankar Prasad) Chawrasia, played the final hole of the Hero Indian Open at the DLF Golf & Country Club aptly told the story of a somewhat wacky week and underlined the eccentricities of the Gary Player-designed layout.

Without ever leaving the fairway on the rock, rough and water-strewn 624-yard par 5, the diminutive Calcutta-native teed-off with a 3-wood, then hit sand wedge/8-iron/sand wedge to the green en-route to completing a seven-shot victory with a two-putt bogey 6.

And there’s more. On the previous hole, Chawrasia’s blind approach struck the massive rocks beyond the putting surface and rebounded safely onto the putting surface.

In contrast, his playing partner, Gavin Green of Malaysia, saw his second shot hit the railroad ties supporting the bank of a bunker and careen off into the spectacularly rocky hazard short and right of the green. Little wonder then that only seven men were under par at the end of an eventful four days in the Indian capital of New Delhi. And little wonder then that play was painfully slow, one understandably disgruntled competitor reporting that it took four hours to complete 12 holes on the rain-affected third day.

Still, none of the above should detract from the beautifully controlled performance put in by Chawrasia, one of the shorter hitters on the European circuit. That closing bogey was one of only six dropped shots recorded by the 39-year-old four-time European Tour champion. Remarkably too, all four have come both in his home country and the same city. The Delhi Golf Club was the scene of Chawrasia’s victories in the 2008 Indian Masters and 2016 Hero Indian Open. And now he has two wins at the DLF, the first the 2011 Avantha Masters.

Having predicted a winning score of 10-under-par at the beginning of the week, Chawrasia proved himself prescient as well as proficient by hitting that mark exactly with his closing 71. No one else was close. Green was alone in second place, one shot ahead of Scotland’s Scott Jamieson and former BMW PGA champion Matteo Manassero. Two of the only three players in the field ranked inside the world’s top 100—Rafa Cabrera-Bello of Spain and India’s Anirban Lahiri—were in the group of three tied for fifth spot.

SSP Chawrasia gained 275,828 points and made a massive jump in the European Tour’s Race to Dubai, moving from 194th to 18th position as he targets a debut appearance in the season-ending DP World Tour Championship from November 16-19 at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai

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Are you pinching yourself surveying a leaderboard with so many big names in your rear-view mirror, including Tiger Woods, that guy with 14 majors and 79 PGA Tour wins, a whopping nine shots back? “No.” It was a politely delivered but emphatic response from a 17-year-old who is clearly comfortable on his carefully-plotted path to golf’s professional promised land.

Thomas’ round was rightly celebrated, especially by the increasingly rowdy Dubai Creek and Emirates GC members among his galleries and by the developmental MENA Tour on which Thomas became the first amateur winner at his home Dubai Creek Open in September.

“Was a good day, can’t complain. Holed a few putts. Hit some really good iron shots and had a chip in on five [for birdie], so nice day,” was Thomas’ understated analysis of the round of his life afterwards.

“When you play well it’s easy, when you play bad it’s difficult. The wind picked up on our back nine, which was our front. It got a bit tricky on the front but I just kept my head and it was a good day.”

The 68, as meritorious as it was, also needs to be put into context because low numbers often lead to unadulterated expectation. That in turn breeds burden, something a player so young doesn’t need.

As Thomas reminded the media before his Desert Classic debut, he’s still two years from finishing school (admittedly correspondence school so he can prioritise golf) and has only just begun his top flight golfing education; the Desert Classic is his third European Tour start.

Also, while he’s playing the Majlis from the extreme tips this week and has to contend with lusher rough and faster
greens than normal, Emirates GC is a home away from home. Learning to eke out scores when your swing is off-key on foreign fields is what separates contenders from pretenders.

Thomas has achievde that, at junior level at least, having won the Scottish Boys’ Strokeplay.

Mature beyond his years, he knows the European Tour is a different ballpark altogether and isn’t getting ahead of himself. Asked what it was like being made an “honorary member” at Emirates GC, he was quick to set the record straight.

“I wouldn’t quite say honorary member. I’m not a legend yet,” he said.

“But for sure it’s awesome and a big thanks to Dubai Golf for helping me with my membership [at Emirates GC and Dubai Creek], which is a huge cost. Just great to be in association with this club.”

Thomas described playing alongside Anirban Lahiri  (69) and S.S.P Chawrasia (77) in an all-Indian threesome as the perfect group for his first Desert Classic even though “they were speaking a lot of Hindi which I don’t understand.”

The teen also loved the support from his growing galleries.

“There was a bit of noise. I think I annoyed [Open champion Henrik] Stenson on the 7th hole, on our 4th, when I made birdie. But no, it was awesome. They helped me ride the momentum today with just how much noise they were making, so I couldn’t really play bad.”

“I just feel more comfortable here, obviously this being my home [patch]. Abu Dhabi gave me a bit of confidence because I played well there, was around the cut line [he missed by five shots]. Today just felt really good on the course, got off to a hot start.”

Indeed. Starting on the 10th, Thomas went out on 35 and came home in 33 with the inward nine highlight being a chip in with his sand wedge from the 20 yards left of the 5th green. A second bogey of the day on the 7th stilted his progress but means the amateur is just three shots off the lead in a group of five including Stenson.

“It would be awesome to make the cut in, I guess, my home open. But not really thinking about it,” he said.

So how will you approach Friday? “Play like I did today (laughs). Stick to my game plan, it worked today and so can work tomorrow as well. My iron play was very good and my chipping was very good. I knew if I missed a green I’d still be able to make up and down.”

It will be fascinating to see how Thomas responds Friday and hopefully into the weekend. Either way, he’s soaking up every lesson as he prepares for the paid ranks thanks to ‘golf in DUBAi’s’ increasingly influential MENA Tour breeding ground.

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