Indonesia regain IGT-PGM trophy
Visiting Malaysia can hold their heads high despite coming up short
INDONESIA won the annual IGTPGM Championship at Gunung Geulis Golf & Country Club in Bogor with a three-point margin, achieved on the back of a solid singles performance.
The 15½ to 12½ victory handed the home team a second triumph in the Ryder Cup-styled tournament, which meant they drew level with Malaysia, who won the inaugural event in 2017 and last year.
After the first two days of fourball and foursomes pairings, the teams were tied on eight points apiece, before Indoenisa, skippered by Jubiliant Harmidy, turned the heat up with a 7½ to 4½ point showing in the singles.
It was a deserved win for the Indonesia Golf Tour squad, but the Professional Golf of Malaysia side were by no means trodden on. Indeed, playing captain Kemarol Baharin, who had Siva Chandhran as his deputy, said he was proud of the way his players committed themselves.
“It was not easy out there,” he said. “Indonesia did well and on their day they won, so hats off to them. I’d say they used home advantage very effectively - similar to how we played at home last year and two years before that.
“But we also played well this week and came up just short in the singles. As a captain there is little you can do once the singles get started. It’s up to the players to deliver and we did well under the circumstances.
“The course was new to us and did not have any yardage books, so that did not help us,” added the 34-year-old Kemarol who was leading the team for the first time.
With the title on a knife edge after the first two days, Sukree Othman, Siva Chandhran, Kim Leun Kwang and Shahriffuddin Ariffin delivered a point apiece in the singles, while Nicholas Fung came through with half a point. He finished his singles all-square.
Sukree, one of the senior statesmen in the team, won convincingly as he romped to a 5up victory.
The in-form Kim, a recent winner of the PGM Sabah Championship - an event co-sanctioned with the Asian Development Tour, won 2up, while Siva Chandhran and Shahriffuddin both won 1 up.
The other players in Team Malaysia were Rizal Amin, Daeng Rahman, Razli Yahya, Wilson Choo, Amir Nazrin and R. Nachimuthu.
The combination of Fung and Nazrin served the visitors well in the foursomes. They were unbeaten with a victory in a one match and a half in the other. The inclusion of Fung was particularly good news for Team Malaysia.
The 29-year-old, who played in all three EurAsia Cup tournaments as well as the 2016 World Cup, chipped in with two points on his own, having also picked up a half in the singles.
His experience certainly lent weight to a side that had a good mix of youth in the squad.
For their efforts Malaysia were rewarded with a RM62,000 purse, while the Indonesian team collected RM115,400 .