{"id":7284,"date":"2012-01-22T20:58:52","date_gmt":"2012-01-22T18:58:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/01\/golf-grace-beats-els-and-goosen-in-playoff\/"},"modified":"2012-01-22T20:58:52","modified_gmt":"2012-01-22T18:58:52","slug":"golf-grace-beats-els-and-goosen-in-playoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/golf-grace-beats-els-and-goosen-in-playoff\/","title":{"rendered":"Golf-Grace beats Els and Goosen in playoff"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Ken Borland<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">GEORGE, South Africa<\/span> Jan 22 (Reuters) &#8211; South African<br \/>\nBranden Grace beat compatriots Ernie Els and Retief Goosen in a<br \/>\nplayoff after they had each finished on 12-under-par to claim<br \/>\nthe Volvo World Champions title at the Fancourt Links on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Grace birdied the 18th hole in a sudden death playoff to<br \/>\nclaim back-to-back European Tour titles, beating Els and Goosen<br \/>\nby one stroke at the par-five closing hole.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The 23-year-old South African must have thought he had<br \/>\nwrapped up the win in regulation play as he stood over a<br \/>\nfour-foot putt for birdie on the 18th, but he shovelled the<br \/>\nshort putt horribly wide to force him into a playoff with his<br \/>\ntwo seasoned compatriots.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Els&#8217;s tee shot on the sudden death hole was down the left<br \/>\nand ran through the fairway into the rough, putting him under<br \/>\nimmediate pressure.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The three-times major champion hacked out on to the fairway<br \/>\nand then hit a superb long-iron third shot that ended 15 feet<br \/>\nfrom the hole. Els&#8217;s birdie putt was just wide.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Goosen hit his drive down the middle of a fairway and his<br \/>\nsecond on to a bank just right of the green, but his hopes were<br \/>\nended by an awful chip that finished 25 feet short of the flag.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Grace hit a three-wood from the fairway on to the green and<br \/>\nan excellent first putt ensured that he had another little<br \/>\nfour-footer for the win.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Nicolas Colsaerts had a three-foot putt for par on the 72nd<br \/>\nhole of regulation play for a place in the playoff, but the<br \/>\nBelgian rushed it past the hole.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Ken Borland GEORGE, South Africa Jan 22 (Reuters) &#8211; South African Branden Grace beat compatriots Ernie Els and Retief Goosen in a playoff after they had each finished on 12-under-par to claim the Volvo World Champions title at the Fancourt Links on Sunday. Grace birdied the 18th hole in a sudden death playoff to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-7284","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7284\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}