Chalmers wins Australian Open, despite prowling Tiger

Greg Chalmers captured the second Australian Open title of his career, but his success was overshadowed by the charge of Tiger Woods, who staged a final day charge which threatened to wreck the Australian’s day of glory.

Chalmers posted a 3-under par round of 69 to see off Woods and compatriot John Senden, but endured a nervy few moments as the latter almost holed a curling 50-foot putt for birdie that would have forced a playoff. However, Senden’s putt just stayed the wrong side of the hole and swept past the cup by a matter of inches to give Chalmers the win.

But it was Woods who grabbed all the attention. Leading at halfway, Woods seemingly blew his chances with a poor third round that dropped him off the pace. It has been a common complaint with the former world number one for some time now; getting into a threatening position before throwing in a stinker to undo much of the good work.

Undaunted, Woods set out to make amends on the final day; after all, Woods’ charges up the leaderboard from seemingly uncompetitive positions is one of near-legend. And he threatened to do so again, as he signed for a 67 to close just two behind the winning score.

Just two off the pace heading into the turn, Woods hooked his tee-shot at the 11^th hole over into spectator country and found his ball in a heel-print in the sand. He played back to the fairway before missing a 7-footer for par, but recovered that dropped shot on the next hole with an 18-foot birdie putt – one of only five birdies to be made on the hole Sunday.

An attempt to drive the green at the 13^th hole ended with another dropped shot, and Woods was lucky he only dropped one as his ball barely made it across the water hazard, landing just outside the hazard line. Instead of dropping, Woods elected to play from the lie, and his shot then ricocheted from a tree and almost landed in another pond. After coming up short with his chip onto the green, he was forced to get up-and-down to limit the damage to one.

Then came a glorious eagle at the 14^th hole, where he chipped in from just off the green; another almost followed at the 17^th that would have tied the lead – Woods missed a 12-footer, but made birdie. A two-putt par on the last finished his day’s work.

“Two bad tee shots on the back nine cost me,” Woods said. “Two holes on the back nine today, and I putted awful yesterday, or I would have been right there.”

But the finish does show that Woods is maybe coming back to life, and with the Presidents Cup due to kick off this week over the same venue, Woods’ performance has perhaps gone some way towards vindicating his controversial wild-card selection for the event by captain Fred Couples.

In an injury-blighted season, it was Woods’ best finish of the year. The only other time he has featured at the top end of the leaderboard was back in April in the US Masters at Augusta, where he was tied for the lead heading into the turn on the final day.

Defending champion Geoff Ogilvy shot a 7-under par 65 to take a share of fourth spot with Adam Scott, who again had Woods’ former bagman Steve Williams along. Also sharing fourth spot were Nick Watney, Jason Day and Nick O’Hearn.