Singapore, Jul 6 (PTI) Avani Prashanth, who received a special sponsor’s invite to the Trust Singapore Ladies Masters, was the best-placed Indian at 35th place despite a nightmarish start to the USD 100,000 China LPGA event here on Thursday.

Avani, the only amateur among three Indians in the 129-player field, received an invite into the event for her past record on the US Kids Golf Tour, the Singapore segment of which is also hosted by the Laguna National Resort.

Starting from the back nine of the Masters course at the Laguna National, which in recent months have hosted the DP World Tour and the Ladies European Tour, the world’s 78th ranked amateur, Avani had three bogeys in her first holes on the 10th, 12th and 14th.

She birdied the 11th, but at 2-over after five, she looked in a tight spot. She fought back well with some steady golf and managed to keep the damage down with no further bogeys over the next 13 holes and had one birdie on her last hole, the ninth.

She closed with 1-over 73.

Avani started on the tenth with three bogeys in the first five holes against just one birdie.

“Things just did not work out at the start, but I am happy at the way I held up after that start,” said Avani.

Pranavi Urs had a birdie on the third and was 1-under through six when she hit a terrible stretch with four bogeys in five holes from the seventh to the 11th but parred the last seven holes to card 75 and keep herself in the hunt for the cut.

She was tied 60th, the cut-off to make the final round.

Seher Atwal also had a tough time around the turn with two doubles on ninth and 11th. She had three other bogeys against just two birdies in her round of 5-over 77 and was tied 90th and the current cut line is 3-over.

China’s Sui Xiang, who broke through for her maiden win at the season-ending event in Zhuhai Challenge last December, also won the first event of 2023 in Tianjin. Looking for her third win, she shot a bogey-6-under 66 with two birdies on the front nine and four on the back nine.

She led by two shots over five players tied for second at 4-under 68. The bunch included local Singaporean amateur Shannon Tan (68) besides Thailand’s Sherman Santiwiwatthanaphong, 26, the current leader on the CLPGA following her win Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Championship in Shanghai last month.

Sherman, who played on the US LPGA Tour between 2017-2019 had five birdies against one bogey.

The other three players at 68 were Japan’s Ayaka Suzuki, China’s Cai Danlin and Thailand’s Kultida Pramphun.

Source: PTI News