Tiger Woods was better than Scottie Scheffler

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Men's golf has a new number 1: it's Scottie Scheffler who got it all in Texas. The WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play, overcoming Kevin Kisner in the final 4/3, and the leadership. Removing from the throne, after 36 consecutive weeks as "king", the Spaniard Jon Rahm.

Scottie Scheffler and Tiger Woods

In Austin, the American Scheffler signed the feat avenging the defeat that came last year, in the last act of the mini world circuit tournament, when he was beaten by Billy Horschel. The 25-year-old from Ridgewood (New Jersey) has once again shown all his talent, especially in match play matches (in the last Ryder Cup, in Wisconsin last September, he managed to clearly beat Rahm).

Professional since 2018, until last February he had never managed to establish himself on the PGA Tour in 72 appearances. Then, he has celebrated three titles in the past 42 days. In fact, Scheffler won the Phoenix Open and the Arnold Palmer Invitational - PGA Tour - only to take the limelight at the WGC. It was since 1997 (David Duval, three exploits in 21 days) that a golfer failed in this feat. Scheffler has made his three of the last five events played by him to crown a path as a protagonist. At the Austin Country Club (par 71), after beating Horschel in the round of 16 he won over Seamus Power in the quarterfinals. Then, in the semifinals, he settled for 3/1 Dustin Johnson (later fourth and beaten in the final for third place by Canadian Corey Conners), WGC champion in 2017. And in the last act he dominated the scene with another past winner of the competition, Kisner (winner in 2019).

After 36 consecutive weeks of domination by Rahm, Scheffler thus became the 25th player (since 1986, when the Official World Golf Ranking was established) to rise to the top of the world rankings for the first time. Not only that: Scheffler - who graduated from the University of Texas as, among others, colleague Jordan Spieth and NBA champion Kevin Durant - is the sixth youngest player (after Tiger Woods, Spieth, Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas and Rahm) to lead the world rankings (at the age of 25, 9 months and 6 days). Also a box-office champion, the exploit at the WGC earned him $ 2,100,000 out of a total prize pool of 12,000,000. The earnings recorded in his career on the PGA Tour thus rise to an altitude of 14,901,992. First golfer to win the WGC after finishing second the year before, he has extended his leadership also as regards the FedEx Cup. And now at The Masters, from 7 to 10 April in Augusta (Georgia, USA), he will be the man to beat.

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/nMwDSb9

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