Golf: Goosen Europe’s number one

Retief Goosen clinched the European Order of Merit title today - and then 35 minutes later added the Telefonica Madrid Open for good measure.

Sun, 28 Oct, 2001 - 17:34

Retief Goosen clinched the European Order of Merit title today - and then 35 minutes later added the Telefonica Madrid Open for good measure.

With the money list crown secure once Darren Clarke finished only tied sixth, the 32-year-old South African could concentrate on trying for his third win of the season.

But he had to go to the third hole of a sudden-death play-off with Warwickshire’s Steve Webster to achieve it, holing a 10-foot birdie putt after Webster had missed from five on the first.

For the 25-year-old from Atherstone it was a third runners-up finish of his tour career, but it was perhaps only fitting that Goosen should wrap things up in the grandest possible manner.

He is the first non-European to finish top since Greg Norman in 1982 and he did it with two tournaments still to come.

‘‘This is my 10th season on tour and to be number one is unbelievable,’’ he said.

‘‘It was nice to round it off this way and it’s a great feeling.

‘‘It’s still got to sink in a bit, but it’s been a dream year. The competition is really tough and it’s hard to think I am the best player in Europe this year.’’

Now into the world’s top 10 for the first time as well, US Open champion Goosen admitted that he thought he was about to lose on the first play-off hole.

Of the putt on the third, however, he added: ‘‘It was downhill and there was no way I could leave that one short. All I had to do was pick the perfect line and I did.’’

Goosen closed with a 68 and Webster a 66 as the pair had tied on the 20-under-par total of 264, Goosen bogeying the last just as he had when he won the US and Scottish Opens and when he lost the Lancome Trophy from four ahead with four to play last month.

After Webster’s short miss on the first, Goosen had the chance on the next again the 18th but after coming out of a fairway bunker to 15 feet he left the birdie attempt short.

Back they went to the short 17th this time and after Webster, from short of the green, had chipped just past with a three-wood Goosen holed to take the £145,904 cheque and so lift his earnings for the year to £1.75million.

Clarke, second on the Order of Merit to Colin Montgomerie in 1998 and to Lee Westwood last year, said: ‘‘Retief has played consistently well all year.

‘‘He won one of the most difficult majors to win and played superbly at Loch Lomond to win there as well.

‘‘Hopefully my time will come. I was playing really nicely until the St Louis world championship was called off and the putter has let me down since. I’ve not been able to convert my chances.’’

Prior to his US Open breakthrough in June, Goosen had never finished higher than 10th in any major, but he had been seventh on the Order of Merit in 1997 and fifth in 1999 and that after missing the start of the season with a broken left arm suffered while skiing.

His pedigree was known long before that. He and Ernie Els were amateur rivals, but Goosen’s progress was halted in a frightening way when he was struck by lightning while playing, an incident which left him with an irregular heartbeat and some hearing problems.

He recovered, however, to be South African amateur champion in 1990, then their Rookie of the Year in 1991. He won the European tour qualifying school the following season and in his first event of the 1993 finished second in the Dubai Desert Classic.

People expected more of him then than he was able to deliver, but two more feathers in his cap came when he was unbeaten as South Africa won the Alfred Dunhill Cup at St Andrews in 1997 and 1998.

‘‘He’s good enough and ready now to win a major,’’ said teammate Els at the time, but it did not come straightaway and eventually Goosen started working with Belgian sports psychologist Jos Vanstiphout.

The sessions were to bring handsome rewards. When Goosen had two putts from 10 feet to become US Open champion and three-putted, missing from only two feet, he might have cracked.

But, lucky to have an 18-hole play-off the next day rather than an instant shoot-out with Mark Brooks, Goosen was able to spend time with Vanstiphout and took the positives out of the situation rather than the negatives.

‘‘I’ve beaten 154 of the 156 players, now there’s only one left and I like those odds much better,’’ was the message.

He putted beautifully when they faced each other and so became only the seventh non-American ever to win the title in its 101-year history.

And now, after winning the Scottish Open as well, he becomes only the fifth non-European to be Europe’s number one, following compatriots Bobby Locke (1946, 1950 and 1954) and Dale Hayes (1975) and Australians Norman von Nida (1947) and Norman.

With two eight-lite bottles of champagne waiting at home - left-overs from his wedding earlier this year - he was able to tell his wife Tracy to put them on ice when he took a two-stroke lead with a round to play.

Webster initially caught him with three birdies in the first five holes, but then handed back the initiative by three-putting the eighth.

Goosen doubled his advantage by chipping in from around 30 feet at the next and pitched to three feet on the 10th.

Webster answered that with a 25-foot putt, however, and after Goosen three-putted the 13th they were back level when Webster pitched to three feet two holes later.

Goosen got his nose back in front by hitting his tee shot to four feet on the short 17th, but then bunkered his approach to the 349-yard last and with the ball below his feet came out far too strongly.

Londoner Brian Davis shot a career-best 62 to finish joint third with Diego Borrego a stroke behind, the Spaniard being desperately unlucky on the last when his second shot hit the flag and rebounded 25 feet away, from where he two-putted.

Most disappointed of all had to be Ireland’s David Higgins, who after leading at halfway and joint second with a round to go had a closing 75 the second worst score of the day and so still has some work to do to spare himself a trip to the qualifying school next month.

Borrego is safe now, moving up from 140th to 98th and so is Indian Jeev Singh, who improved from 122nd to 105th by finishing sixth.

Latest leading positions in the European tour Volvo Order of Merit after the Telefonica Madrid Open:

1 R Goosen (Rsa) £1,751,720,

2 D Clarke (NIrl) £1,157,264,

3 E Els (Rsa) £1,073,216,

4 P Harrington (Irl) £969,916,

5 C Montgomerie (Sco) £934,984,

6 B Langer (Ger) £934,017,

7 T Bjorn (Den) £912,099,

8 P Lawrie (Sco) £871,622,

9 N Fasth (Swe) £741,681,

10 A Cabrera (Arg) £709,753,