Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat won his fourth European Tour title after a 2 and 1 victory over Australia’s James Nitties in the final of the ISPS HANDA World Super 6 Perth.
The 28-year-old only entered the event seven days ago on an invite, and arrived having not played any practice rounds at Karrinyup Country Club. He needed four trips up the 18th in a play-off on Saturday night to claim the last of the 24 spots in the Super 6, and then had to come through five rounds of match play and 35 holes on Sunday.
After wins over Ben Eccles, Yusaku Miyazato, Sean Crocker and Lucas Herbert, he produced one final push to beat Nitties and move back into the top 50 in the world rankings.
The victory was Aphibarnrat’s second match play title after his win at the 2015 Saltire Energy Paul Lawrie Match Play.
After 54 holes of stroke play, the players were facing off against each other over the tenth, 11th, 13th, 14th, 12th and 18th holes, with the 90-yard shootout hole used to separate those still all square.
Nitties had defeated Nick Cullen, Dimitrios Papadatos, Callan O’Reilly and Sam Horsfield en route to the final, with Englishman Horsfield finishing fourth after losing 3&1 to Herbert in the play-off for third and fourth position.
Aphibarnrat said: “It’s just been an awesome week. I’m so happy. I’ve been close to winning a few times over the last few months, so to finally get the job done is very satisfying. Every single match was tough, but I’m glad my determination has paid off.”