“My consolations go out to Scott Barr and Prom Meesawat as they played brilliantly today and I'm just fortunate that I managed to pull it off.”
The candid acknowledgement from eventual champion Anirban Lahiri aptly summed up the quality of golf displayed by the leading trio on the final day of the $300,000 SAIL-SBI Open at the Delhi Golf Club course on Saturday.
The final round card of one-over 73 — Lahiri's worst of the week — was just enough to leave him in a playoff with Meesawat, who shot a 70 to match the Indian's 72-hole tally of 14-under 274.
Horrific triple-bogey
Barr, whose title-hopes lay buried under the horrific triple-bogey on the penultimate hole, finished a stroke behind after a 71. Lahiri collected $47,550. Meesawat settled for $32,550 and Barr received $18,300.
By becoming the first Indian to win this annual event when Meesawat gave up on the first play-off hole, Lahiri also added a second Asian Tour title at the same venue to go with the inaugural Panasonic Open last April.
Lahiri, who blew away a three-stroke overnight lead on the front-nine and trailed Barr by a stroke from the 11th to the 16th holes, was not required to do anything spectacular to win.
“I misread too many putts today. It was not bad putting but poor judgement of line,” was Lahiri's honest admission.
Unforgiving nature
First, Baar experienced the unforgiving nature of this tree-lined course. On the 171-yard par-3 17th hole, Barr sent his tee-shot into the bushes, slipped three shots down, to leave Lahiri and Meesawat in joint lead.
Baar signed off with a final-hole birdie to take the third spot.
Lahiri's missed birdie-putt from five feet on the final hole meant a play-off against Meesawat. Now, it was Meesawat's turn to do Lahiri a favour.
After Lahiri opened the playoff on the 18th hole by landing on the fairway, Meesawat messed up his tee-shot by finding the bushes on the right.
Lahiri “stayed in the moment and did not think far too ahead” to set himself up for a birdie-putt from under five feet.
Difficult lie
Meesawat, who was required to take a ‘penalty-drop', hit the ball to the left of the green for a difficult lie. It did not take the baby-faced Thai long to sense that he could not beat Lahiri's possible birdie on the par-five hole and gave up.
“I managed to hit all the fairways today but unfortunately I had to miss my only one on the play-off,” was Meesawat's regret.
Final scores (Indians unless stated): Anirban Lahiri (65, 69, 67, 73), Prom Meesawat (Tha) (72, 64, 68, 70) 274; Scott Barr (Aus) (71, 68, 65, 71) 275; Ben Fox (USA) (70, 70, 72, 66) 278; Siddikur (Ban) (74, 67, 70, 69) 280; Shankar Das (74, 69, 70, 68), Ashok Kumar (74, 68, 69, 70), Gaganjeet Bhullar (68, 69, 70, 74) 281; Vinod Kumar (70, 68, 74, 70), Stephen Lewton (Eng) (72, 73, 66, 71) and Shamim Khan (71, 68, 71, 72) 282.
Other Indians: Ghulfam (73, 68, 66, 76) 283; Randhir Ghotra (70, 71, 73, 71) 285; Sanjay Kumar (71, 71, 71, 73), Abhinav Lohan (70, 71, 71, 74) 286; Harmeet Kahlon (70, 71, 75, 71), Rahil Gangjee (73, 67, 71, 76) 287; Shiv Kapur (70, 71, 73, 75), Mukesh Kumar (68, 77, 71, 73), Vijay Kumar (73, 72, 71, 73) 289; Rashid Khan (72, 73, 70, 75), R. Murthy (73, 71, 75, 71), Himmat Rai (74, 71, 75, 70) 290; Manav Jaini (68, 70, 76, 77), Roop Singh (70, 75, 73, 73), Vikrant Chopra (73, 70, 76, 72) 291; Gaurav Ghei (71, 72, 71, 79) 293; Mohd. Islam (68, 76, 74, 76), Harendra Gupta (72, 72, 74, 76) 294; Raju Ali (75, 69, 77, 74) 295; Feroz Ali (71, 74, 76, 77) 298; Mohd. Sanju (71, 74, 77, 81) 303.
