Wednesday 25 March 2015 20:04, UK
Adam Scott ended Australia's long wait for a Masters champion after another thrilling final day at Augusta.
Adam Scott ended Australia's long wait for a Masters champion after another thrilling final day at Augusta National.
The 32-year-old nailed a 15-foot birdie putt on the second extra hole against 2009 champion Angel Cabrera to clinch his long-overdue maiden major crown.
Cabrera had duelled for the lead for much of the day with Scott's compatriot Jason Day, who got off to a flying start when he birdied the first and holed out from a greenside bunker for eagle at the next.
After Day's challenge faltered down the stretch, Scott, who birdied 13 and 15, looked as if he had provided the tournament's iconic moment as he rolled in a superb 25-foot birdie putt to cap a flawless three-under 69 and take the lead.
Behind by a shot as he played the last, Cabrera needed to find a birdie of his own to match Scott's clubhouse total of nine-under and he came up with the goods. Defying the heavy rain, he split the fairway and then knocked a sweetly-struck iron to two feet which he tapped in to force extra holes.
The popular Argentine shaved the cup with his chip for birdie back at 18 as the first play-off hole was halved in par, and both hit excellent approaches to the 10th as the light faded.
Cabrera's putt curled agonisingly past the hole, and Scott held his nerve to find the middle of the cup to become Australia's first winner at Augusta in the 77th edition of the tournament.
Day had been three off the lead at the turn, but three consecutive birdies from the 13th took him two ahead on nine under after Cabrera found Rae's Creek at 13 and bogeyed.
But Day flew the green at 16 and could not get up and down, and he dropped another shot at the 17th as he signed off with a 70 to finish third on seven under.
Tiger Woods' bid for a fifth title was hampered by a cold putter from the start as he stuttered to the turn in 37, although birdies at nine, 10, 13 and 15 salvaged a 70 and a top-four finish on five under.
He could even been even closer but for an incident in round two when his approach at the 15th hit the flag and spun back into the water, turning a likely birdie into a bogey. That bogey later became a triple when he was given a two-shot penalty for an illegal drop which many felt should have led to his disqualification.
Woods shared fourth with another Australian, Marc Leishman, who also could not get much to drop on the greens in a battling level-par 72.
Brandt Snedeker started the day tied for the lead with Cabrera, but after an opening birdie he bogeyed the fourth and fifth before getting back to eight under at the eighth.
But his race was run after bogeys at 10, 11 and 14, and another dropped shot at the last added up to a 75 which left him alongside Thorbjorn Olesen on four under.
Olesen had been seven over par after five holes of his second round, but he vaulted up the leaderboard with a third-round 68, which he matched on Sunday to ensure a return to Augusta in 2014.
Lee Westwood threatened to mount a significant challenge with birdies at the second and seventh, but he saw a succession of putts slide past the cup as he closed with a 71 to finish six behind and tied eighth with Sergio Garcia.
WINNING WAYS
Adam Scott conquered Augusta by following the path of many previous champions and topping the greens in regulation stats. The Aussie found the putting surface in the right number 76.4% of the time and his excellent iron play was key. When Scott did miss the green, he made a superb job of saving par, finishing third in the Scrambling stats. Interestingly, he also found just one greenside bunker all week, while hitting just 11 fairways out of 28 on the weekend didn't hurt him.
