Tvesa, Gaurika join battle with Neha in women’s tour second leg

By Rahul Banerji

Neha Tripathi will be seeking to try and build on her comprehensive win in the season-opener of the Hero Women’s Pro Golf Tour 2019, when she tees off in the second leg at the Oxford Golf Resort in Pune on Wednesday.

The Tour stays in the western city for the second successive week and this event too carries a purse of Rs8 lakh.

The second leg also will see Tvesa Malik, 2018 Hero Order of Merit winner, and Gaurika Bishnoi, 2017 Hero Order of Merit winner, make their first appearance of the year. Tvesa skipped the first leg as did Gaurika, who has been trying to balance golf with academics and has said she will focus fully on golf after college.

Missing faces

While Tvesa and Gaurika will make the contest keener, amateur Pranavi Urs, who finished second and Diksha Dagar, who was third last week at the Poona Club Golf Course, will be missing. Pranavi is back to preparing for the amateur circuit and Diksha is getting set to play the Australian LPGA Qualifying event.

Also entered for the Australian LPGA Qualifying event are Vani Kapoor, Ridhima Dilawari, Diksha Dagar and Astha Madan. The ALPG qualifiers are scheduled from January 28 to 30 at the Ballarat Golf Club.

The highlight of Neha’s win last week was a five-under 66 on the second day, after which she held her game together on the final day to romp home a winner by five shots. The first leg saw a healthy run of par and under par scores and the stronger field this week should see a few more.

Marquee group

The first threesome out on the course on Wednesday will be Amandeep Drall, Gursimar Badwal and Tvesa Malik, and it will be one of the marquee groups of the day.

Sifat Alag, who made her professional debut last week, will be looking to improve her showing when she tees up with Sonam Chugh and Siddhi Kapoor in the second group. Millie Saroha, who faded away after a solid start in the first leg, will be in the third group with Ishvari Prasanna, who is making her pro debut, and the highly experienced Smriti Mehra.

Jyotsana Singh, Neha Tripathi and Khushi Khanijau are in the fourth group, while Gaurika Bishnoi, Suchitra Ramesh and Komal Chaudhary are in the fifth. Hita Prakash, Mehar Atwal and Afshan Fatima are the penultimate grouping while Dolma Rawat, Ananya Datar and Ayesha Kapur are the final group.

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