By V. Krishnaswamy, IANS,
Sentosa (Singapore) : Jeev Milkha Singh stayed calm in a nerve-wracking finish to clinch the $5 million Barclay’s Singapore Open here Sunday.
Jeev showed nerves of steel as each of three major contenders missed their final putts by the narrowest of margin.
But Jeev, coming to the 18th tee with a one-shot lead, stayed one ahead as he tapped a par putt from six inches and then waited for his rivals, Padraig Harrington and Ernie Els to finish.
Both Harrington and Els narrowly missed their birdie putts, that would have sent them into a play-off with Jeev, leaving him a victor by one shot.
Jeev carded two-under 69 to finish with a total of seven-under 277 and winner of the first prize of $792,50, which confirms his second Asian Tour Order of Merit besides a whole lot of other landmarks.
Jeev becomes the first Asian Tour player to cross $One million dollars with a total of $1,405,607, the highest so far in the history of the Asian Tour. That also took him to the top of the Career earnings with a total of $2,759,191 and ahead of the erstwhile leader Thongchai Jaidee of Thailand.
The win was Jeev’s third win of the season and on a third different Tour. He won the Bank Austria Golf Open on European Tour and the Nagashima Shigeo Invitational Sega Sammy Cup earlier.