Tyrrell Hatton outlasted 5 five players including Mattias Schwab in a six man play-off to win the Turkish Airlines Open in the most dramatic setting, ending up under the spectacular floodlit 18th hole at the The Montgomerie Maxx Royal.
European Tour Turkish Airlines final scoreboard https://www.europeantour.com/european-tour/turkish-airlines-open-2019
If you missed it there were more twists and turns than Murder on the Orient Express and even Hercule Poirot could not have predicted the outcome.
A birdie on the par5, 72nd hole and the resulting 67 got the grumpy little Englishman a place in the record equaling play-off at -20 along with Frenchmen Benjamin Hebert and Victor Perez, American Kurt Kitayama, South African Erik van Rooyen, and hard luck Austrian Matthias Schwab who had led from the get go, and held off the pack all day, right until his last putt.
"It was a close call, I had some good looks and good chances coming down the stretch in regular play and didn't take advantage of them. In the play-off, it is what it is."
To his credit Hatton had to chip-in to keep his hopes alive on the first playoff hole, but a par was enough to overcome Schwab who missed a four footer at the fourth time around to hand Hatton his fourth European Tour trophy. Hatton had missed a 10 footer of his own to win it outright, and was still grumbling to himself about his bad luck, when Mattias missed his. Kitayama missed a 6 footer of his own for the win on the 3rd playoff hole.
Nobody was a loser in this thrilling finale, the European Tour will be lauded for the dramatic floodlit setting under a full moon no less, however they will be questioned about splitting the 6 finalists up into 2 threesomes, which meant the second threesome had to stand and wait on the tee until the first group had played out of range.
Hatton gets a staggering $2m US payday and a trip to the Masters, while the other 5 who T2 get less than $500,000.
Next week it is a 60 man field in South Africa for the Nedbank Challenge, the second in the last of the Rolex Series, before the Race to Dubai wraps up in the UAE for their Tour Championship.
All these events have been nutured along by the European Tour, most recently headed up by Canadian Keith Pelley whose mandate was to increase purses to become the equivalent of the PGA Tour. For example the Rolex Series has been developed into 8 premier events with huge prize money. The Turkish Airlines sponsorship was nothing more than an 8 man exhibition featuring Tiger Woods six years ago. The Nedbank Challenge was a 12 man exhibition to promote Sun City until it became a full field Rolex Series event 3 years ago.
This morning's finale is as dramatic and exciting as it gets, and being beamed around the world, did nothing but good for the game, the European Tour and the players, not to mention the millions who tuned it in.
Bryan Angus
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