Golf: Aditi rallies to lie at 30th position, Diksha placed 80th at Women’s Open

India's Aditi Ashok overcame a bogey-bogey start to finish even par and in tied 30th position on the first day of the AIG Women's Open

Walton Heath (UK): India’s Aditi Ashok overcame a bogey-bogey start to finish even par and in tied 30th position on the first day of the AIG Women’s Open here on Thursday.

Four players shared the lead at 3-under 69 each.

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India’s other player in the field, Diksha Dagar, who like Aditi has a win to her name this season, seemed to have clawed her way back from 3-over with back-to-back birdies on 16tth and 17th, only to drop a shot on 18th and finish at 2-over 74 and in tied 80th place.

Thailand’s rookie Jaravee Boonchant, who has missed seven cuts in last eight starts but has two top-10s this season, was among the four leaders at 3-under. The others are Perrine Delacour of France, Emily Kristine Pedersen of Denmark and Jeongeun Lee6 of Korea.

China’s Yu Liu was also 3-under but had two more holes to play.

The conditions were challenging with the players facing a lot of problems if they missed the fairways. Also the greens though large needed a lot of focus. Aditi found nine of 15 fairways and reached 14 of the greens in regulations but needed 32 putts for her 72.

After bogeys on first and second Aditi played steady even though she missed a few birdie chances. She finally found birdies on Par-5 11th and the Par-4 18th to get to even par.

Diksha also began with a bogey, but birdies on second and fifth seemed to put her on the right track.

Then came a horror stretch with three bogeys in a row from seventh to ninth and she turned in 2-over. Another bogey on 14th meant she was 3-over, but birdies on 16th and 17th gave her a chance to finish better but the bogey on 18th was a setback.

Among those tied 30th with Aditi were the likes Minjee Lee, Leona Maguire, Stacy Lewis, Ayaka Furue and Hae Ran Ryu. The US Open winner, Allisen Corpuz was tied 13th at 1-under.

The scoring was not all that easy as defending champion Ashleigh Buhai, Lydia Ko, Atthaya Thitikul, Brooke Henderson and the talented Chiara Noja were among the big names who shot 74 each and were tied 80th, the same as Diksha.