Women's Golf Association of India

Fine start for Indians as Diksha lies third and Vani fifth in Netherlands

Arnhem, the Netherlands, July 15:Diksha Dagar got off to a flying start in the opening round with a superb card of 4-under 68 that placed her Tied-third at Big Green Egg Open. Dagar, the 2019 Investec Women’s South Africa Open, was just one shot adrift of the co-leaders, Sarah Schober and Liz Young, who had opening round scores of 67 (-5) at the Rosendaelsche Golf Club in the Netherlands.

Another Indian featuring in the Top-5 was Vani Kapoor (69) was Tied-5th, while Ridhima Dilawari (72) was T-28, Amandeep Drall (73) was T-41 and Neha Tripathi (79) was T-111.

Diksha, who has been steadily playing herself back into form, opened with a par but then birdied the next three to get to 3-under in four. Another birdie on ninth saw her turn in 4-under 32. On the back nine she birdied 12th and 17th but dropped shots on 10th and 13th.

Diksha was delighted with her performance on the greens. “It was a really good day, I’ve been working on my putting and I was feeling confident about my putts so I was making more of them, and that was helping my hitting too,” she said.

“Because I’ve been practicing and practicing I found it easier to read the greens and find the lines. My hitting was also very good, I was able to attack the flag and make the putts. I was only in the rough once but I was lucky that I had a good lie so I was able to make par from there, otherwise I was hitting all the fairways.”

Vani had a slow start with one bogey on the front nine, but then had five birdies against just one more bogey for a fine round of 3-under 69 that put her inside Top-5.

Ridhima Dilawari started from the 10th had three birdies against one double bogey and one bogey.

Sitting one shot behind co-leaders Schober and Young are Dagar and Whitney Hillier, with the duo both shooting 68 (-4) as they made the most of the fine weather.

Local hopes lie with Pasqualle Coffa after the opening round with the Dutch star shooting 69 (-3) to sit three shots off the lead. Four others including India’s Vani Kapoor shot 69.