THRILLING FINISH ON CARDS ON FINAL DAY AT ABU DHABI COURSE
t looks like a traffic jam at the top of the leaderboard with England’s Tyrrell Hatton taking a slender one-shot lead going into final round of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship today.
Hatton, who won the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship at St. Andrews last year, finished with a 68 for the day and finished at 13-under.
Hanging down at Hatton’s throat is US Open champion Dustin Johnson tied alongside three-time Abu Dhabi winner Martin Kaymer, 2014 champion Pablo Larrazábal, Thai Kiradech Aphibarnrat and England’s Tommy Fleetwood with 12-under.
The Englishman, who had seven top 10 places last season, was beaming with excitement and accepted that he ‘surprised’ himself with his stunning effort.
“Well, to be honest, I didn’t do a whole lot of pack. I spent most of my time playing Xbox and chilling out at home to be perfectly honest. So a little bit of a surprise to see where I’m at this week, but very happy with one round to go,” said Hatton, whose game plan for the crucial final day was to focus on his own game.
“Obviously big names are up there, so I’ve just got to focus on my game and try and play as well as I can. I love this place. It’s one of my favourite events of the year, so hopefully I can go out there tomorrow and have a good day. It should be an exciting finish and I can stay on top,” said Hatton, who neutralised a bogey with a birdie in the front nine before closing with a bogey-free back nine with a final-hole birdie to take a one-shot lead. The chasing pack of Aphibarnrat, Larrazabal and Kaymer were the last finishers but they were all unable breach that deficit.
Overnight leader Kaymer felt that he had to bear the brunt of the strong winds during the afternoon session and missing fairways proved costly.
“Well, I didn’t hit as many good tee shots as the first two days and missed few fairways today, and then it’s difficult to create birdie chances. And then I had a couple of poor shots on 10 and 11. Made a couple bogeys there,” said Kaymer, who is looking for his fourth title at the capital course.
Pumped up
“The wind was strong from the first tee to maybe 13 or 14, and then it was quite tricky to hit the fairways, because the holes, even when it was downwind, you have to cut so much off of the fairway. Almost the holes become doglegs. Fought back well with another birdie, and then the putts didn’t drop in the end,” added the German asserting that he was all pumped up for the challenge on the final day
“I just really enjoy the challenge tomorrow. I’m not having a lot of pressure of winning the golf tournament. Always when you lead a golf tournament by three or four shots, you kind of expect yourself to win, and I don’t really have that pressure tomorrow. I know I’ve done very well here in the past, so I can play very free and very aggressive tomorrow.” Hanson (SWE) 68-69-68, Wang Jeunghun (KOR) 68-67-70 206 — Alex Noren (SWE) 71-67-68, Ross Fisher (ENG) 69-69-68, Lee Westwood (ENG) 68-69-69, Maximilian Kieffer (GER) 70-67-69, Henrik Stenson (SWE) 64-71-71 207 — Callum Shinkwin (ENG) 68-74-65, Branden Grace (RSA) 68-70-69, Bradley Dredge (WAL) 68-69-70, Paul Dunne (IRE) 68-66-73, Rafa Cabrera-Bello (ESP) 67-66-74
Larrazabal too looked pretty relaxed following his effort for sharing the second spot and he insisted that he couldn’t have asked for a better position to be going into the final round.
“Not too much attention going into the final round is what I wanted and I’m happy with that. Hopefully, I can have a good round tomorrow,” said the Spaniard, who has won here in 2014.