Amateurs in the van as Avani Prashanth leads at Golden Greens

By Rahul Banerji

Amateurs Avani Prashanth, Vidhatri Urs and Sneha Singh held three of the top six places after round one of the Hero Women’s Pro Golf Tour event at the Golden Greens Golf Club.

Avani won the third leg of the ongoing season in Mumbai, while Sneha had topped the 11^th leg in 2019 in Hyderabad.

On Wednesday, Avani shot a 1-under 71 to hold a one-shot lead over Saaniya Sharma (72).

Vidhatri and Sneha, besides last week’s winner Jahanvi Bakshi and Afshan Fatima were in a tie for third place with rounds of 73.

Seher Atwal, Lakhmehar Pardesi and Siddhi Kapoor shot 74s, and three others including amateurs Khushi Hooda and Nishna, and Rhea Saravanan carded 75s.

Avani was 2-under till the 14^th hole with birdies in 3 and 4 but a double-bogey sent her back to level par.

The Bangalore girl then fought back with birdies on 15 and 17 with a bogey in between to be the only player under par on the day.

Saaniya Sharma had three birdies and as many bogeys for her level par 72.

Vidhatri had a steady front nine with one birdie to turn in 1-under. On the back nine, she had two birdies, three pars and four bogeys to finish on 73.

Eagle show

Sneha landed the only eagle of the day when she holed her third shot on the Par-5 fifth.

She had two more birdies on the back nine against three bogeys and a double for her 73.

Jahanvi Bakshi, playing three groups behind Avani, had two birdies and a bogey in the first 16 holes.

She seemed well placed to share the lead with Avani but double-bogeyed late in the day on 17 and carded a 73.

Scores and round two tee times

8 am: Anisha Agarwalla 89; Khushi 88;

8:10: am Rhea Jha 83; Neha Tripathi 81; Suchitra Ramesh 81

8:20 am: Jyotsana Singh 80; Ishvari Prasanna 80; Disha Kavery 78

8:30 am Geetika Ahuja 78; Ananya Datar 78; Mehar Atwal 78

8:45 am: Oviya Reddi 77; Rishika Muralidhar (A) 77; Shweta Mansingh 76

8:55 am: Khushi Khanijau 76; Hitaashee Bakshi 76; Trimann Saluja 76;

9:05 am: Nishna Patel (A) 75; Khushi Hooda (A) 75; Rhea P. Saravanan 75

9:20 am: Siddhi Kapoor 74; Lakhmehar Pardesi 74; Seher Atwal 74

9:30 am: Afshan Fatima 73; Jahanvi Bakshi 73; Sneha Singh (A) 73

9:40 am: Vidhatri Urs (A) 73; Saaniya Sharma 72; Avani Prashanth (A) 71

Also read: Jahanvi Bakshi keeps her cool to land second career win at DLF