Oct 23, 2016: The scent of victory can be a heady mixture that can send the best of men into a wobbling web of wild thoughts. Earlier in the year we saw that happen to Jordan Spieth at the Amen Corner in the Masters. Anirban Lahiri suffered a similar fate at the par-5 third hole in the final round of the CIMB Classic. The Indian conceded a quadruple bogey nine there and defending champion Justin Thomas stole his thunder from there with a sensational 64 to clinch the title yet again.
Anirban Lahiri, four shots to the good at the start of the day, seemed set for a maiden PGA TOUR title. But he conceded his advantage straight away at the same place where he has notched up two birdies this week.
He showcased his pedigree with an enormous bounce back – scoring a birdie at the next hole and a brilliant eagle at the par-5 fifth to recover three of his lost strokes. A bogey at the sixth was wiped off the card with a birdie right at the turn, one over for the day.
Determined to leave a mark, Anirban played some resolute golf from there to keep his sheet clean, but in the face of a mighty effort by Justin Thomas it wasn’t to be enough.
Anirban was two under through the final twelve holes of the PGA TOUR and Asian Tour joint sanctioned event, with birdies at the ninth and 14th holes underlining his resilience.
Anirban Lahiri ended the week at 19-under 269 in a tie for third with Derek Fathauer, with the two men trailing the winner by four strokes. Fathauer made 67 in the final round.
“Disappointment obviously. It was obviously a harder start. I got unlucky with the tee shot and just compounded my errors. My short game again, coming up a little bit to bite me. I tried my best. I fought back as best I could, but I just couldn’t get the putts to fall on the back nine,” said Lahiri, who was runner-up at the Venetian Macao Open last weekend.
“I had numerous lipouts and then just really disappointed that I didn’t birdie 17 or 18 or even 16, for that matter. Just didn’t get the numbers right with my wedges. I didn’t hit them close. It’s very disappointing.”
With the consolation of achieving his best finish to date on the PGA Tour, Lahiri knows his time will eventually come. “I have the confidence. It’s not like I need additional confidence. But I need validation now. I need validation in terms of my game. I need to see that happen. It’s just not happened enough, and it’s been a year of near misses so far,” said the 29-year-old.
“It’s a good problem to have but it’s something that I want to change obviously for the rest of this season on the PGA Tour. Not the way I would like to play on a Sunday, not at all. It’s hard.”
Justin Thomas was in sensational form – producing eight birdies in a stellar Sunday finish that helped him trump the field by a comfortable three shot margin. His score of 23-under 265 relegated Hideki Matsuyama (66) to second place.
Anirban took home a cheque for $406,000 for his commendable effort (66-66-65-72) this week. The winner took home fifty OWGR points a healthy $1.26mn in earnings.
