Tyrrell Hatton gained the Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks Championship at St. Andrews on Sunday.
Robert Perry/PA Wire by way of Getty Pictures
The massive information out of final week’s Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks Championship was that PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan and Rory McIlroy all made good and performed golf collectively. However Sunday at St. Andrews noticed another huge information too: one of the crucial important non-major wins by a LIV Golf professional.
Tyrrell Hatton shot a final-round 70 on the Outdated Course at St. Andrews to win the Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks for the third time however, crucially, the primary time as a member of LIV Golf.
Hatton started the 2024 season on the PGA Tour, teeing it up on the Sentry and the Sony Open in Hawaii in January. However on Jan. 31, LIV Golf introduced that the English veteran was amongst 4 execs becoming a member of the upstart league funded by Saudi Arabia’s Public Funding Fund.
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With LIV Golf occasions not awarding Official World Golf Rating factors, Hatton has seen his rating plummet since that fateful day. When he left the PGA Tour to affix LIV he was ranked fifteenth on this planet, only a few spots from his peak at twelfth.
By the point he teed it up within the first spherical on the Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks final Thursday, he had fallen to No. 38.
However the discipline on the Dunhill Hyperlinks — which is an annual pro-am performed at St. Andrews’ Outdated Course, Carnoustie and Kingsbarns — isn’t any joke. In actual fact, it was one of many strongest non-major fields discovered on the DP World Tour all 12 months. Along with Hatton, it featured World No. 3 Rory McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood, Shane Lowry, Billy Horschel and Robert MacIntyre, together with LIV stars Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Patrick Reed and Louis Oosthuizen.
With the win, Hatton made an enormous leap within the World Rating, all the best way as much as No. 20, practically making up all the bottom he’d misplaced taking part in on LIV in 2024. One of many causes that’s essential is that every one 4 main championships have {qualifications} based mostly on OWGR rating.
The Masters and Open Championship settle for the highest 50 within the OWGR, the U.S. Open exempts the highest 60 and the PGA Championship usually gives particular invitations to anybody inside the highest 100.
Hatton is already certified for the Masters by way of his T9 end at Augusta Nationwide in 2024. However to make it into the Open and the U.S. Open by way of World Rating, he’ll have to remain inside the high 60 and high 50, respectively, by every match’s cutoff dates subsequent 12 months.
That can now be quite a bit simpler because of the leap to No. 20 he made final weekend on the Outdated Course.
The opposite essential merchandise on high of Hatton’s thoughts on the Dunhill Hyperlinks was taking part in his means onto the European Ryder Cup staff. The auto-qualifiers for the European staff are decided by a factors system largely based mostly on DP World Tour efficiency and World Rating.
Hatton moved to fifth within the European Ryder Cup standings on account of his win. It additionally earned him spots within the upcoming Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and the DP World Tour Championship, each scheduled for November.
These begins will give Hatton two extra alternatives to enhance his place within the OWGR and the European Ryder Cup standings, as he famous on Sunday after his win.
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“It feels wonderful. My final win was Abu Dhabi ’21 on the DP World Tour. In order that was a very long time in the past. And I knew once I got here again to play the British Masters and the Spanish Open final week, that I actually needed to earn sufficient factors to have the ability to play in Abu Dhabi and Dubai from a World Rating factors perspective, a Ryder Cup factors perspective,” Hatton mentioned. “I’ve been lucky to play the DP World Tour Championship yearly that I’ve had my tour card. Successful right now secures my spot there. I’m actually excited that I can compete in these two occasions on the again finish of the 12 months.”
Making the accomplishment much more particular was that Hatton performed the Dunhill Hyperlinks alongside his dad, and it ended up being the first-ever match win his dad witnessed in particular person.
“That is the third time we’ve been capable of play this match collectively, and I feel lastly this 12 months, my dad form of settled down and he truly performed some good golf. He performed unreal yesterday, which was good to see,” Hatton mentioned Sunday. “I do know that it made it extra particular if we have been capable of win the staff occasion, as properly, however finally these are recollections that neither of us will ever neglect, and for me to win right now the person occasion, that’s the primary time that I’ve gained with my dad at a match. That makes it extra particular, and it was fairly cool that he had a entrance row seat for it.”
