As in 2016 and 2017, Tyrrell Hatton, the last of the avant-garde golfers to join LIV Golf, lifted the Dunhill Links trophy, the championship contested by celebrities and professionals on the courses of Kingsbarns, Carnoustie and St. Andrews , which closes the tournament on Sunday.
The electric Englishman, Jon Rahm’s teammate in the Legion Colsaerts, whose lack of habit in these outcomes affected him on the last hole. After a great drive on the Eden Garden, the easy 18th hole at St. Andrews, he played the putt with a second shot from the fairway and came up short, forcing a third shot that he did not hole out.
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Hatton, who played with his father as a team – they were second in that classification won by the Dane Thorbjorn Olesen and Dermot Desmond, Irish billionaire and largest shareholder of Glasgow Celtic – had remained comfortable in the lead until the 13th hole, even with three advantage strokes. But there, after going to a fairway bunker on a stretch with a headwind that was as long as a winter night, and signing a double bogey, he made another mistake and saw how the Belgian chased him down.
“After that, I thought I was no longer the leader. But then in the 17th minute I saw that I was still in the lead and that encouraged me,” Hatton said, impressed by how St. Andrews was for all the players on Sunday. Only Fleetwood and Koepka, among the top 10, were able to play the second nine holes under par. An enormous contrast that had the two greatest examples among which were two Spaniards, David Puig and Jon Rahm.
Tyrrell Hatton is congratulated by his fatherGetty Images
The first was the man of the day for a couple of hours. His start was formidable in the holes that lead away from the stately clubhouse that tops the most famous Rolex watch in the world. In an exhibition he made six consecutive birdies between holes 2 and 7, and two more on holes 9 and 10 to stand on the 11th tee with eight under par. The young man from the Fireballs had even looked at the option of victory.
He played movies. He left all the shots with a clear option for birdie and eagle on the par 5. The sum of all the putts he made up to the 10th to take advantage did not exceed 33 feet – 11 meters – an astonishing figure for eight birdies. But then came the blackout. He went to a place of thick heather and had to drop with penalty. And he starred in the same sequence as Hatton: double bogey and bogey. And there the magic ended. He finished fourth, with 39 strokes for the nine seconds and a total of 68 that took him to fourth position. He had been third in Madrid last week.
David Puig (22) on the 14th hole of St. AndrewsRoss Parker – SNS Group
Rahm suffered something similar. Until the 10th he was playing at 6 under par, but he volleyed that green and then two three-shots led him to make three consecutive bogeys. He finished with 69 strokes in seventh place and applauding the victory of his friend, whom he had asked for advice on how to play these courses this week. He has not lost the champion’s sense of smell.
