Shubhankar

Sharma

The 25-year-old Sharma, who vaulted from No. 281 to 159 in the world rankings, was one of just three players who managed four straight sub-par rounds at Yas Links, shooting 70-71-67-71 to finish at 9-under 279 and one shot back of winner Thomas Pieters. “It was very important, and it just gives me a lot of confidence going forward into the season,” he said Sunday. “Some of the top players in the world were here this week, and gives me a lot confidence that I can finish high up on the leaderboard and compete with them. There’s so much to look forward to now.” Last season Sharma made 17 cuts in 28 starts with four top 10s including a T-3 in October at the Open de Espana. He’ll continue on in the UAB at this week’s Dubai Desert Classic, where he’ll make his fifth career start. Sharma has missed the cut just once in four appearances at Emirates GC and finished T-22 there last year.

It marked the fourth top-10 result this season for the 25-year-old Sharma, a two-time winner on the European Tour, who also finished T-8 at the Made in HimmerLand, T-9 at the Cazoo Classic and T-9 at the BMW PGA. Sharma has made 17 cuts in 26 starts this season, but he’s on a roll of 10-for-12 in his most recent stretch of play. He jumped to No. 255 in the world rankings – up from No. 308 – and moved up to 54th in the Race to Dubai. Sharma’s breakthrough season came in 2018 when he became the youngest Indian to win on the European Tour, claiming the tri-sanctioned Joburg Open at age 21. He added a second title two months later at the Maybank Championship, carding a bogey-free, 10-under 62 in the final round to win. Sharma will stay in Spain for this week’s Andalucia Masters, where he’ll make his third career start and seek to make his first cut.

The 24-year-old India native shot 69-70 (1 under) to miss out on the weekend, and he is batting .500 in cuts made this season, going 4-of-8. He did make two straight cuts prior to Spain, though, finishing T-61 at the Austrian Open and T-30 at the Kenya Savannah Classic. Last season, he went 9-for-22 and failed to post a top-10 finish for the first time in three full seasons on the European Tour. Sharma’s breakthrough season came in 2018 when he became the youngest Indian to win on the European Tour when he claimed the tri-sanctioned Joburg Open as a 21-year-old. He added a second title two months later after carding a bogey-free, 10-under 62 in the final round to win the Maybank Championship.

The Indian is currently T2 on the live board alongside Justin Rose (thru 17), Rory Sabbatini (17) and Tapio Pulkkanen (4). Sharma bogeyed his second hole of the day at Olgiata, No. 11, before finding some momentum with birdies at 13, 15 and 16. But he gave all those gains back via double bogey-6 at 18 and bogey at 3. That briefly dropped him outside the top ten but the two-time European Tour winner responded impressively with birdies at 4, 7 and 9 to put himself in nice position for a weekend challenge.

The Indian golfer has quietly been finding form of late, getting himself inside the top 20 at halfway in the Korn Ferry Tour Championship and KLM Open before kicking on at the BMW PGA Championship where an actual top 20 (T17) could have been better after he was T3 with 18 holes to play. He missed the cut in the Dunhill Links, but cited tiredness after a grueling itinerary. He went home, enjoyed his mum’s cooking and stayed away from golf for five days – it seems to have worked. He swapped birdies at the fourth and seventh with a bogey at the eighth on the way out, then circled the 14th and 16th before making an eagle-3 at the 17th. “I hit a lot of good putts before that, they just weren’t falling,” he said. “Tee shot at 16 was really good, a great 4-iron to about seven. At 17, a good drive and 4-iron to the middle of the green. The putt was a bonus from 40-feet. Looking forward to tomorrow. Playing well.”

This is proving to be quite the tournament debut for the Indian, who two years ago was not even a European Tour member and in May 2018 had enjoyed such a sensational start to the year that he had been vaulted into accepting invites on the PGA Tour so missed this event. Alas there was a reaction to that success and he hasn’t recorded a top 20 on a main tour since he was T6 in the Hong Kong Open last November. Now he is on the brink of turning that around. He ticked seven of the first 12 (2, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10 and 12), but dropped shots at the sixth and 13th. He righted the ship by draining a 16’0" birdie at the 16th before getting up and down for birdie from short of the par-5 17th. However a duffed chip cost him another dropped shot at the 18th. “The whole year has been a bit slow, but haven’t felt like I played really bad,” he said. “I was reading the greens really well today and I’m learning more about Wentworth every day.”

The Indian is T8 and five swings back of the leaders Danny Willett and Jon Rahm, sharing his position with Andrew Putnam, Tony Finau and Viktor Hovland. His lap was a serene one, witnessing par breakers at the first, sixth and seventh heading out, then the 12th and 14th on the way home. A stark contrast with Thursday when he made five birdies, but had to atone for a triple bogey-8 at the fourth and bogey-4 at the fifth. He heads into the weekend chasing a first top 20 since he opened this season with T6 at the Hong Kong Open.

The Indian’s form is heading in the right direction after something of a fall off. He missed the cut in the Kenya Open, was T30 defending the Maybank Championship, T27 on home soil in the Indian Open and then T22 alongside Anirban Lahiri in the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. His linksland experience is limited. He carded a pair of 74s to miss the cut at the Irish Open in Ballyliffin last year, his 68-70 was not good enough to make the cut in the Scottish Open at Gullane, but he learned some lessons in that fortnight to shoot 73-71-71-73 which earned him T51 in the Open at Carnoustie.

DLF G&CC is Sharma’s home course and he put that local knowledge to great use today, at least to begin with. Starting at 10, the Indian star played a faultless first nine with par breakers at 12 and 18. He picked up another shot at 1 before jumping into a tie for the lead at 5-under with eagle-3 at 4. His bogey-free card was finally punctured by a dropped shot at 6 and another followed at 7 before he closed with a pair of pars. Sharma was tied seventh here last year and T40 in 2017 but this is just his second round in the 60s. He warmed up for his home event with T30 in last week’s Maybank Championship in Malaysia.

The young Indian jokingly told an Indian journalist last week that he is in better fusbal form than golf form and his scores prove it. He opened 67-64-66 to tie the 54-hole lead in the CIMB Classic but closed 72 for T10. A week later a Saturday 64 in the CJ Cup couldn’t make up for 74-75-74 the rest of the week (T55). He opened 80-80 in the WGC-HSBC Champions and closed it 72-72 for T69. Last week in Turkey he could only manage 70-72-70-67. The good news? Eleven months ago he made his only previous professional visit to South Africa and it was a life-changer: He finished first in the Joburg Open.