Golf Digest Middle East

Giant Leap

Former Women’s Open champion Georgia Hall will be a major threat at the OMEGA Dubai Moonlight Classic.

- BY KENT GRAY

Ggeorgia hall has quietly gone about turning herself into Britain’s most successful female golfer since her last start in the UAE, a selftitled “tired” T-21 finish at Dubai’s Ladies European Tour stop in 2017. It was a performanc­e camouflage­d by the fact Hall had already wrapped up that season’s LET Order of Merit title. ▶ Fast-forward to the present and what isn’t cloaked his her new-found standing even if countrywom­an Charley Hull, at 30th, was a place above Hall in the world rankings at press time. There’s a major edge on Hall’s CV and now the 2019 Women’s Open champion has a LPGA Tour title to rival Hull as well. The Cambia Portland Classic victory in mid-September mightn’t have matched the statue of Hull’s Tour Championsh­ip win in 2017 but was just as satisfying after a couple of years of close calls in the U.S. ▶ Forget not the perfect 4-0-0 record either as Europe upset the U.S. at the 2019 Solheim Cup, including a memorable 2&1 singles victory over Lexi Thompson on the final day at Gleneagles. ▶ Hall has since collected an MBE for services to golf, an ambassador­ial role with the Royal & Ancient and two Rose Series victories en-route to her return to the Middle East for next month’s US$285,000 OMEGA Dubai Moonlight Classic. ▶ The 24-year-old Dorset-based Englishwom­an won’t be the highest ranked player and wasn’t part of the new Pro-Am, floodlit format last year. She’s never teed it up on the Faldo course at Emirates Golf Club, nor under lights. But it’s just another trial the two-time LET Order of Merit champion is happy to accept in a year full of unexpected challenges. ▶ Indeed Hall will surely be one of the toughest players to beat if she can quickly adjust to the bright LEDs and testing greens on a course designed by another tenacious compatriot, Sir Nick Faldo. Given her recent form and endless determinat­ion, it will come as no surprise if that exact narrative plays out at the November 4-6 event. – kent gray

I WILL CERTAINLY COME TO DUBAI FULL OF CONFIDENCE. I’VE NOT YET WON A REGULAR LET EVENT, SO THAT WOULD BE NICE TO DO.

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