Joost Luiten fends off Chris Wood for NBO Oman Open victory

The Netherlands’ Joost Luiten wins the European Tour’s inaugural NBO Oman Open

Joost Luiten was locked in a tight battle with Chris Wood all day Sunday at the NBO Oman Open, but by the time Luiten walked up the 18th fairway at Al Mouj GC he knew the trophy was all but his.

The 32-year-old Dutchman reached 16-under-par (72-66-66-68) to win by two in his sixth European Tour victory.

"“This is why you play golf, to hold trophies. It’s been a great week,” Luiten told the European Tour. “It’s always tough to win out here, all these guys are so good and they keep putting pressure on you.”"

Luiten entered the day tied with Matthew Southgate and Julien Guerrier, but the latter two struggled to get momentum going. Guerrier never looked poised to win his first tournament, but the Frenchman rallied nicely to with three birdies in his final seven holes to earn solo third at 13-under behind Wood at 14-under.

Birdies on holes 2-4 (No. 4 was the toughest hole this week) gave Luiten a three-stroke lead, but he gave two back on the front nine as Wood went out in two-under to tie Luiten from the penultimate pairing.

With perfect conditions and 10 players within four strokes of the leaderboard going into Sunday, a potential shootout at the NBO Oman Open whittled down to friends Luiten and Wood.

A birdie the 13th pushed Luiten ahead by one and both birdied the par-5 16th. Wood was the first to flinch with a bogey on 17, his first since Saturday.

Up by two, Luiten made two steady pars to clinch his first win since his native 2016 KLM Open.

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Between injury and struggles with his game, Chris Wood’s appearance on the 2016 European Ryder Cup team seems far off. The 30-year-old Englishman entered off of three straight missed cuts, but he found something this week off the coast of the Indian Ocean.

It’s funny how expectations can so quickly shift in golf.

“You play poorly for six or eight months without ever thinking you’d put yourself in contention in a tournament and then when you do you’re gutted when you don’t win,” Wood told the European Tour.

Wood earned his first top-five finish since the June 2017 Nordea Masters, and he should move back inside the top-100 with his solo second-place finish.

"“I’m pretty down really but in the grand scheme of things it’s night and day to how I’ve been,” Wood said. “After a couple of days I’m sure I’ll reflect and see it’s a big step in the right direction this week.”"

Next: Does Tiger Woods still intimidate the young guys on the PGA TOUR?

Chip shots

• Willibrordus Adrianus Maria “Joost” Luiten has now won six events in five countries: Malaysia, Austria, the Netherland, Wales and Oman. (Yes, that was just an excuse to use his full name.)
• Through nine pure stroke play events in 2018 on the European Tour, Luiten is the only one to win despite posting a round of par or worse. Luiten rallied from an even-par 72 on Thursday.
• The low round of the tournament was a seven-under 65 posted by Matthew Southgate in the first round and Matthieu Pavon in the second.
• Oman’s lone golfer in the field, 33-year-old amateur Al Rumhy Azaan, missed the cut finishing at 19-over-par.
• Some other notable finishes include the field’s top-ranked player, No. 62 Alexander Levy, tied for fourth (-11), T9. Southgate (-9), T12. Andrew “Beef” Johnston (-8), T16. Andy Sullivan (-7), T61. Darren Clarke and Paul Lawrie (+4), MC. Shubhankar Sharma (+1).
• The European Tour wraps up in the Middle East until the fall at the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters. South Korea’s Jeunghun Wang will defend his title at Doha GC.