By John Huggan
He flopped rather than flew over the finish line, but maybe that was to be expected. After 17 top-five finishes since 2011 and nine in the last two seasons alone—including T-2s and a third in his last four starts—Jorge Campillo’s maiden victory on the European Tour has been a long time coming. So perhaps it was not so surprising that he, ultimately at least, made hard work of clinching the Trophee Hassan II in Morocco.

At the end of a final-round 71 that started with two bogeys in his opening three holes, the 32-year-old Spaniard pulled his drive badly off the par-5 18th tee on the 7,632-yard Royal Golf Dar Es Salam course and was more than a little fortunate to finish in a bunker. The recovery shot found the fairway 129 yards from the green, and from there Campillo successfully avoided further disquiet, making a par to claim the biggest share of the €2.5 million purse. The Madrid native finished nine-under-par 283 in Morocco, two shots ahead of Erik Van Rooyen and a pair of Americans, Julian Suri and Sean Crocker. Another of Uncle Sam’s nephews, David Lipsky, was alone in fifth.

“It has been a long wait—almost 250 tournaments [229 to be exact]—but I didn’t have my A-game today so I am proud of that,” said the former Indiana University graduate who will rise from 90th to 65th in the World Ranking. “It was tough. I was missing shots off the tee, but I hit some great shots coming home and putted great. Waiting on the last tee did not help; I wish I could have hit my tee shot sooner. But I hit a great shot from the bunker. I’m proud of how I finished—like a champion. I have so many promises to fulfill after this win, I will have to take a few weeks off. But it has all been worth it.”

Of those closest to the new champion, Van Rooyen will perhaps have most cause for regret. Two shots clear with nine holes to play, the South African stumbled early on the back nine. By the 14th, courtesy of Van Rooyen’s three-putt bogey, Campillo was ahead to stay. Birdies on the 16th and 17th only confirmed that status.

Speaking of which, Campillo’s long wait for this overdue success is even more surprising when one considers his record before turning professional in 2009 and graduating from the Challenge Tour two years later. While at Indiana, he claimed the Big Ten Conference’s “triple crown” in 2008—taking the season-long golfer of the year award, earning the Les Bolstad Award for low stroke average and winning the Big Ten individual championship. Later that year, he also won the Spanish Amateur title, and he represented his country at every level and Europe three times in the Palmer Cup. Impressive stuff that only underlines the old saying that, on tour, no one cares—not even a little bit—about what anyone achieved as an amateur.

The post Former amateur standout Jorge Campillo finally wins first European Tour title after nearly eight years and 17 top-five finishes appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

After what will be a near 16-month hiatus, the remodelled 10-tournament regional development circuit will be re-launched at Ayla Golf Club in Jordan from February 9-11.

But there are three key dates before the US$100,000 season opener which fronts a five-tournament spring swing in Jordan, Kuwait and Dubai (the five remaining events in an Oct.-Nov. autumn window will be announced along with the tour’s first naming rights sponsor and a major co-sanctioning agreement soon).

Key among the three pre-season events is a 36-hole qualifier in January from which the top three players will go on to contest the 30th Omega Dubai Desert Classic at Emirates Golf Club from Jan. 24-27.

The ‘2019 Omega Dubai Desert Classic Shootout’, to be held at Dubai Hills on Jan. 20-21, is a coup in that will not only assist in rekindling stalled public interest in the MENA Tour but ensures the tour’s membership more than the clichéd “stairway to stardom” peddled in the new season PR. In another nod to regional development, the top-10 players on the second tier UAE PGA Tour will be invited to play the shootout alongside the top-60 players exempted from the 2017 MENA Tour order of merit (OOM) and the first 50 players who signed up for January’s Q-School.

Related: WIN a four-ball at Dubai Hills Golf Club!

There will also be an invite to the European Tour’s Maybank Championship at Saujana Golf and Country Club in Kuala Lumpur from March 21-24 for the OOM leader after the five spring events. Indeed, the top five players on the money list at the halfway stage of the 2019 MENA Tour season will be rewarded; the second placed player will tee it up in the Trophee Hassan II in Morocco from April 25-29, the third-placed player earns automatic entry into the new Jordan Mixed Open at Ayla G.C. from April 4-6 while the fourth and fifth players will be headed to the Asian Tour’s Indonesian Masters from July 4-7.

Increased prize funds for every event, on-going Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) status, perfect weather and the prime conditioning of courses on the schedule has ensured there has been no drop-off in interest from budding touring pros despite the season-long hiatus.

So much so, an oversubscribed entry list for Q-School has prompted organisers to arrange two separate qualifiers at Ayla immediately proceeding the 2019 season bow at the same club – from Jan. 29-Feb. 1 (category A) and Feb. 2-5 (category B) – to accommodate the overflowing, global entry list.

After Q-School, the tour will bounce around the region for five events in a month – at Ayla G.C. (Feb. 9-11), Al Zorah G.C. in Ajman (Feb. 19-21), Dubai (course TBC; Feb. 26-28), Sahara Kuwait Resort (March 3-7) and Dubai (course TBC; March 12-14).

Getty Images
Henric Sturehed won the last MENA Tour event, the tour championship at Al Zorah, in October 2017. The Swede and since gone on to contend on the European Tour.

The minimum prize fund on offer each week will be $75,000, an increase of 50 per cent from previous $50,000, with at least three tournaments to boast $100,000 purses.

“We have listened to our members on various issues and used this hiatus of one year to ensure that we not only have a strong, financially viable Tour with streamlined operation and logistics, but also one that makes it easier for our members to participate and excel,” said new MENA Tour general manager Robbie Williams.

“The Qualifying School at Ayla Golf Club is our first step in a new journey, one which is going to be very exciting for the players and the industry in the region. The response so far has been fantastic. Even before we announced any dates, we have had over 600 registered interests by golfers from across the globe about our plans for 2019 and beyond.”

The MENA Tour’s new 2019 logo.

Established in 2011 by the Sheikh Maktoum Golf Foundation, the MENA Tour is one of 20 global Tours recognised by the OWGR. It global recognition makes it a genuine pathway for players in the Middle East, North Africa and beyond to events like the Olympic Games and other major championships.

Rayhan Thomas, who became a poster-boy for the MENA Tour when he won the 2017 Dubai Creek Open and last weekend secured his second professional title as an amateur, has committed to playing much of the spring schedule before taking up a scholarship at Rickie Fowler’s alma mater, Oklahoma State University.

For more information on Q-School, the ‘2019 Omega Dubai Desert Classic Shootout’ and new-look spring schedule, visit menatour.golf

The post Dubai Hills-Desert Classic prelude to new-look MENA Tour schedule; another European Tour opportunity for UAE PGA brethren  appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
You could argue there is no golfer on the European Tour playing with more pressure this season than Alexander Levy. At No. 66 entering this week’s Trophee Hassan II in Morocco, the 27-year-old is the top-ranked Frenchman in the world. And with the Ryder Cup being held outside Paris this September, the hope that he can represent the country on the European team as it hosts the biennial event for the first time means Levy has plenty riding on his play the next few months.

Given all this, Levy’s two-under 70 in the final round at Golf Dar Es Salaam, good enough for eight-under 280 total and a one-stroke victory over Alvaro Quiros, is as meaningful a victory as any to date this season.

“This feels so good,” Levy said after the round. “I’m a little bit tired now because it was really tough today, but I did a really good job today. For me, I played an amazing game. I’m so happy to win this trophy.”

Levy started the day and made his first birdie on the third hole, a five-footer that grabbed him a share of the lead. Another birdie on the par-5 fifth, put him out front alone. As Quiros and others chased him, Levy made a series of clutch par saves to remain out front.

The shot of the day for Levy came on the par-3 17th, when he hit his tee ball on a hole that had given up only five birdies at the time to four feet, and converted the putt to give him a two-stroke edge. Quiros, who birdied 17 as well, needed an eagle on the par-5 18th to force a playoff but could only manage a birdie.

Andrew Redington/Getty Images

It was Levy’s fifth career European Tour win (he trails only Thomas Levet’s 6 for most wins by a French player in tour history) and builds off the momentum that he has generated so far in 2018, with three top-10 finishes in five previous starts. However, Levy is not quite ready to feel comfortable about a Ryder Cup spot.

“Like what I said from the start of the season, I need to improve my game,” Levy said. “I need to work a lot. I worked a lot the last two days, two weeks, and I won this trophy.”

The best of Alex Levy's winning round in under 3️⃣ minutes.#TropheeHassanII pic.twitter.com/4P9PpFqmKA

— DP World Tour (@DPWorldTour) April 22, 2018

The victory, however, comes at an ideal time as Levy heads to Asia for this week’s Volvo China Open, where he is a two-time winner and the defending champion.

“It’s a good win, but I need to go back to work because we can see we have a lot of good players in Europe,” Levy said. “So it will be tough to make it.”

And yet Levy is slowly finding himself in position to be a legitimate choice for the squad. And it can hurt to see this kind of tweet from European Tour Ryder Cup captain Thomas Bjorn.

Congratulations @alexlevygolf
Brilliant performance on a tough golf course.
Well done my friend

— Thomas Bjørn (@thomasbjorngolf) April 22, 2018

The post Will a Frenchman compete in the Ryder Cup outside Paris? The chances got a little better on Sunday appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Golf Digest Middle East has learned Jordan’s new Ayla Golf Club is poised to host a mixed gender, full-field strokeplay tournament in 2019 pitting Ladies European Tour (LET) players against men at opposite ends of the pro spectrum – the Challenge Tour and Staysure Tour (formerly European Senior Tour).

Full details are to be confirmed “shortly” but it is understood 40 players from each of the LET, Staysure and Challenge Tour circuits will tee it up in pursuit of a single title and a share of the same purse. The kicker is that the women, seniors and Challenge Tour players will play from separate tees at the Greg Norman-designed layout in Aqaba – a tricky calculation for organisers attempting to equalise the anticipated distance advantages of the younger men.

Related: ‘Kingdom Come’ – We review Ayla Golf Club

The European Tour’s Dubai bureau chief Nick Tarratt confirmed the Jordan event during a media conference Monday to unveil the Challenge Tour’s new season-long ‘Road to Ras Al Khaimah”, culminating in the elevated Ras Al Khaimah Challenge Tour Grand Final.

Tarratt confirmed the Al Hamra G.C. event was the first of a number of Middle East “initiatives” in the pipeline before alluding to on-going talks for events in Jordan, Bahrain and Kuwait.

“We are in discussions with a number of countries, venues and tourism authorities in the Middle East region about future European Tour initiatives. Some discussions are quick, others will have a slower burn [time],” Tarratt said.

“In addition to the recently launched Saudi Arabia European Tour event at the end of January 2019 at King Abdullah Economic City, abutting onto the Desert Swing of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and the Omega Dubai Desert Classic, we are in conversations with partners in Jordan about hosting a ‘first of its kind’ mixed professional tournament, involving representation from the LET, Challenge Tour and Staysure Tour that we hope to sign and make announcements shortly for a 2019 tournament.“

The par 5 17th at Ayla G.C. in Aqaba, Jordan.

Events where men and women play separate events simultaneously are not new. The LET and the PGA Tour of Australasia co-hosted the Oates Vic Open in February while the Trophee Hassan II and Lalla Meryem Cup are European Tour and LET events respectively again set to be played side-by-side in Rabat, Morocco next week.

Women have also teed it up in PGA Tour events previously, led by the legendary Babe Zaharias who blazed a trail at the 1938 Los Angeles Open – six years after winning two track and field gold medals at the 1932 LA Olympic Games. Annika Sorenstam, Suzy Whaley and Michelle Wie have followed suit since while Dame Laura Davies is set to play in the Staysure Tour’s Shipco Masters in Denmark from June 1-3.

But the proposed Jordan event is believed to be the first time a full field of men and women have played for the same title and prize-money in an event that doesn’t fall into the exhibition, made-for-TV or silly-season space.

If confirmed, it will continue a period of innovation under the watch of European Tour supremo Keith Pelley.  It started with the World Super 6 Perth two years ago, a strokeplay event which morphs into a final day of matchplay knockout matches. Then came the €1 million GolfSixes in England, an event played by two-man teams in a greensomes format; an additional four wildcard teams, including women will compete in the second edition at Centurion Club north of London next month.

Related: GolfSixes event expanding in Year 2 to include wildcard pairings, women’s teams

Later in May, Ryder Cupper Thomas Pieters will host the new Belgian Knockout where the opening 36 holes will follow a familiar strokeplay format before the leading 64 players then go head-to-head in knockout strokeplay matches contested over nine holes on the weekend to determine the winner. Thereafter follows the Shot Clock Masters in Austria in June, the first tournament in professional golf to use a shot clock on every shot as part of the European Tour’s bid to combat slow play.

Denmark won the inaugural GolfSixes. Getty Images.

Each player in the 120-man field will have 50 seconds for the first player in a group to play any given shot, 40 seconds for subsequent players. Players will incur a one-shot penalty for each bad time incurred and these will be shown as a red card against their name on the leaderboard. Each player will have the right to call two ‘time-outs’ during a round which will permit them twice the usually allotted time to play the shot.

Where ever the new formats lead, Tarratt is confident the Middle East will remain a hotbed of the global game ahead of the 30th anniversary of the pioneering Desert Classic next January.

“The Middle East has always been a key part of the world for the European Tour and in the future it seems it will be even more important,” he said. “The region is very much getting stronger. The model of play…with tourism authorities, the golf facilities, the hospitality, it is a winning model that we hope to expand further in this region.”

So more events are potentially on the horizon?

“Yes certainly. We have the window of October to March-April – where else in the world would they like to play? I did a list of players who had come to Jumeirah Golf Estates [to practice at the European Tour Performance Institute] only since the end of November up until now…101 European Tour players have come to JGE and Dubai so they come by choice. It is the destination of choice.”

Ayla has already hosted a MENA Tour event but the proposed tournament would boost global exposure greatly.

The post Battle of the Sexes: Jordan event set to pit LET women against Challenge Tour men and European Seniors stars appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

The 22-year-old intends addressing his putting problems this week and will likely feel the positive vibes from last year at Doha Golf Club flood back if he does.

Related: After late misery in Muscat, Wood eyes more Doha delight

Wang took a three-stroke advantage into the final round last year and ironically watched a lengthy birdie putt that would have claimed the Mother of Pearl Trophy on the 72nd hole brake agonisingly shot, and right in the jaws, of the cup.

But when Jaco Van Zyl three putted the par-5 18th at the first time of asking in sudden death (for a fifth European Tour bridesmaid finish), and Swede Joakim Lagergren left himself too much to do from a greenside trap, Wang didn’t need a second invitation and coolly cupped a shorter birdie attempt.

Related: Wang’s meteoric rise continues with dramatic Qatar Masters triumph

At 21 years and 144 days old, he became the third youngest player in European Tour history to win three events. The two gentlemen above him on the list? Italian whiz kid Matteo Manassero and a bloke so legendary he needed only one name, Seve.

But Wang was so in the zone it almost, well sort of, passed him by even if he now concedes “it was a really good experience for me, an unforgettable one.”

“It feels really good to be going back as the defending champion but I don’t remember a lot from last year because all I was thinking about was winning,” said Wang who warmed up for his title defence with a T-26 finish at last week’s NBO Oman Open.

Indeed, Wang’s form has been encouraging in 2018: he was T-15 in Abu Dhabi, T-6 in Dubai and T-62 in Kuala Lumpur. His world ranking, which soared to 39 after the Qatar triumph, has slipped to No.123 after he finished 48th in last season’s Race to Dubai standings, a year after a career high 16th finish when he won the Trophée Hassan II – also after a play-off – and the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open.

Jeunghun Wang finished T-26 at the NBO Oman Open. Andrew Redington/Getty Images.

But Wang is a genuine wizard with a wedge around the greens (Golf Digest has seen it first hand after partnering Wang in the 2016 Abu Dhabi pro-am), touch that could equally take some of the heat off that recently and relatively cold putter.

“I’m hitting the ball really well right now, I’m driving well, my irons are good but my putting is not great in the last couple of weeks. If I putt well maybe I can give myself a chance to win again.”

Oman Open champion Joost Luiten and Race to Dubai leader Shubhankar Sharma, after wins at December’s Joburg Open and the Maybank Championship in Malaysia earlier this month, will give Wang a run for the coveted Pearl trophy.

Related: Joost boost as Luiten wins in Muscat

“I watched Jeunghun Wang last year on the television and that was really nice to see,” said Sharma whose preparation wasn’t ideal after rounds of 73-72 at Al Moj saw him miss just his second European Tour cut and his first since the 2016 AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open.

Andrew Redington/Getty Images. Race to Dubai leader Shubhankar Sharma.

“I know it’s very windy and it looks challenging but I think I will really enjoy it there. Obviously I’m playing well at the moment and I will be hoping for another good week.”

Former Open champions Paul Lawrie (1999), who has twice triumphed in the Qatari capital, and Darren Clarke (2011) are also confirmed starters along Thomas Bjorn.

The European Ryder Cup captain has played the Qatar Masters 13 times, made the cut 10 times and enjoyed three top 10s including victory in 2011. He shared 31st in Muscat and will be buoyed that 10 of this 13 rounds this season have produced red numbers, six of them sub-70 efforts.

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