Rising India golfer Khalin Joshi fired a five-under 67 on the final round but it was not enough to stop Thailand's Poom Saksansin from clinching his second career title at the TAKE Solutions Masters here today.
Local hope Joshi managed a career-best second place at the KGA after finishing with a four-day total of 14-under 270, two strokes adrift of Poom, who kept smiling and made almost no mistakes to bag a winner's cheque of USD 54,000.
Joshi's previous best was T-2nd in Bangladesh in 2015.
Ajeetesh Sandhu played his last 26 holes - back nine of third round and final round - in nine-under to leap frog to sole third, equaling his career-best of a similar finish at home in SAIL-SBI Open in 2011. Sandhu's cards over the weekend were 67-66 for a total of 10-under 274.
Divyanshu Bajaj (69), Abhinav Lohan 69) shared the fourth place with Rory Hie (67), while Honey Baisoya (67) and Rahil Gangjee (68) were tied-8th alongside Suradit Yongchareonchai (66).
Chikkarangappa (73), who started the day with an outside chance, never got his challenge going after the double bogey on second. He was Tied-10th at six-under 278.
Shiv Kapur (69) was Tied-20th, while SSP Chawrasia (74) endured a triple bogey on par-5 11th, where he went out of bounds twice, while playing with a stiff neck for the second day running.
Khalin had a great start with three birdies in first six and a great finish with three birdies in last four, but Poom's steady and smart golf ensured Khalin stayed behind.
Poom never trailed through week after taking the lead with a bogey-free 7-under card as one of the earlier starters on Thursday. Through four rounds, Poom had just five bogeys, three of them on the third day.
Poom found most fairways on most days - except on the third when he managed only five of the 13 fairways, but that day he found 15 of the 18 greens.
Poom said, "Honestly I had the confidence to win. But because I played badly yesterday (round three), I was a bit worried. Yes, I felt nervous but my caddy cheered me. I just continued talking to him. He is a local caddy."
Khalin was just not able to bridge that gap between him and Poom. Khalin did give himself that chance with an opening birdie that cut the lead to one but Poom, never overstretching, birdied fifth. On the sixth Khalin birdied, but so did Poom to keep his nose ahead.
Khalin said, "My friend Shubhankar Sharma told me that the seventh and ninth holes would be the key in the final round and I ended up making bogeys on both.
"On both the seventh and ninth, I followed up great tee shots with a couple of poor approach shots. Those two errors cost me dearly. That is probably where I let it go. But overall, I'm still pretty happy with the week."
He pulled the par putt on 7th and after coming out of the left bunker he missed a 12-foot par putt on 12th. Khalin did get his foot in the door once again, when he birdied the 15th where Poom made his only bogey of the day. The gap which had become four after Khalin's bogey on par-5 14th, was again two.
But Poom hit back magnificently with back-to-back birdies on 16th and 17th and virtually ended all hopes for the Indian. Khalin ended birdie-birdie but Poom played a safe par on last.
Khalin was gracious in defeat and said, "I just had to make birdies and put pressure on him. I did put pressure on him on the 15th hole but he played pretty solid towards the end to take it through and be the rightful winner.
"Poom played smart, kept ball in play, when out of position, hit the ball in the heart of the green. Hopefully, I can have a week like he did."
Poom added, "On hole number three when he holed the long par putt, I thought we will be tied for the lead because I had a tricky seven-foot putt for par. Luckily I sank that. That's probably the closest we came to tying for the lead.
"After that I tried to play my own game. If I played good but Khalin won, then I would be happy for him because he is my friend. But if I played badly and Khalin won, then it would have been very disappointing.
"The birdie on 16 (from 15 feet) gave me a three-shot lead and I knew all I needed to do was hit a good shot on 17 and I would have a good chance to win. The birdie on 16 was very important because it gave me confidence. If I didn't make that birdie and made a bogey on the last hole, it would have been a play-off. But that never happened.
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