Fabrizio Zanotti spurned the chance to win a third European Tour title with three huge errors in his final lap of 2-over-par 39-35=74 in the Oman Open at Al Mouj Golf in Muscat; he ended the week T2 on 6-under 282 with Clement Sordet, Jorge Campillo and Maximilian Kieffer, one swing behind winner Kurt Kitayama.
Each of the top five had a horror story during their week and ultimately Kitayama coped best, but Zanotti will undoubtedly toss and turn when replaying the last round in the next few nights. Holding a one-shot lead as he started the final round, he always rebounded from his mistakes, but will wonder how he made three of them. The first was a double bogey-6 at the fourth, followed by a red number at the fifth. He landed plumb in a bush with his drive at the ninth, found it, still made another double-bogey-6. Birdies at the 13th and 14th got him right back in the hunt whereupon he inexplicably four-putted the par-5 16th for a seven, missing one very short putt and one absolute tiddler. Incredibly, after almost finding water from the 18th tee he very nearly holed for an eagle-2 from 152-yards, but the birdie left him one short of forcing a play-off.